Friday Vocabulary

1. squamous — composed of scales, covered with scales, scaly

She had gotten too close to her idol, and now perceived that the shoulders of his fashionable rope sweater were covered in squamous dandruff flakes, and that he had quite hairy ears.

 

2. cryptesthesia — perception by hidden or paranormal means, such as clairaudience or clairvoyance

Welker preferred to denote the phenomenon as cryptesthesia rather than mind reading, reasoning that some quite mundane mechanism may have delivered the information to the recipient though that person remained unaware how he gained the knowledge.

 

3. bombinate — to buzz, to hum

I prefer The Well-Tempered Clavier of Glenn Gould myself, though I confess that when he bombinates continually it can be somewhat distracting.

 

4. hayward — officer in charge of fences and enclosures, esp. to prevent stray cattle from a commons encroaching upon enclosed fields

The tanner filed a cross-complaint, alleging that his sole milk cow had been maliciously seized by the hayward, who had conspired with Gertrude to allege bovine trespass where none had actually occurred.

 

5. analeptic — strengthening, restoring, invigorating; awakening, esp. from drugged state

After so much weak tea and jello, her analeptic chicken soup was just the restorative I needed to cast aside my sick bed and return to the world of the living.

 

6. blether (also blather or blither) — to talk nonsense volubly; to babble

He really did perform quite heroic feats during the war, you know, though of course we all just assume his tales are false because he is always blethering on about some impossible adventure that current events happen to remind him of.

 

7. vervainverbena officinalis, a common European plant once much used for its supposed medicinal qualities

I see where druids walked the groves of Mona—I see the mistletoe and vervain

[Whitman]

 

8. pavonine — of or like or resembling a peacock

Leave it to Richard Feynman to demonstrate the mysteries of quantum electrodynamics through the pavonine iridescence of a droplet of oil on water.

 

9. threap — to chide, scold, rebuke, blame, reprove; to bicker, argue, quarrel, dispute

It is foolish to have any discussion with him, as he will threap that the color red is heavier than the blue of the noonday sky, and similar nonsense.

 

10. torpid — dormant, unmoving; sluggish, inactive; lacking vigor, apathetic

Too benumbed even to bother picking up the remote, the torpid young man watched unseeing as Vanilla Ice remodeled yet another fixer-upper during the television marathon.

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