1. congener — member of same class or kind as another The zealots of French Revolution, like their congeners, may be recognized by their furious devotion to idealistic purity and their rush to purge anyone they feel disagrees with those ideals. 2. ging — gang; crew of ship or boat Just as the captain …
Tag Archives: bonus word
Friday Vocabulary
1. mizzle — (British) to suddenly depart, to vanish Sure looks like your friend mizzled and left you to pick up the tab. 2. menology — written calendar of saints’ biographies, arranged by each saint’s feast day The conversion of St. Cyriac is only attested in the Greek Menology of Emperor Basil, in which …
Friday Vocabulary
1. egregious — remarkable in a bad way, flagrant To continue supporting my nephew after his blatant malfeasance would be an egregious error on my part. 2. threnody — song or poem of lamentation, dirge, song for the dead The susurration of the wind through the glade seemed a threnody as I watched the …
Friday Vocabulary
1. aelurophile — (also ailurophile) cat lover He had that one condition almost fatal to an aelurophile: an allergy to cats. 2. distrait — distracted, absent-minded I should have known something was wrong when Arthur seemed so distrait at dinner that he ordered red wine with fish. 3. polder — low land reclaimed …
Friday Vocabulary
1. desultory — halfheartedly jumping from one subject to another, fitful, disconnected; lacking consistency, unmethodical, random Was it truly only my own prejudice which made me fear another hour’s desultory conversation with Howard, while I looked forward with eagerness to a delightfully discursive evening’s talk with his cousin? 2. baluster — (architecture) short pillar, …
Friday Vocabulary
1. gyniolatry — worship of women Perhaps Poul Anderson’s gyniolatry may seem to balance Philip K. Dick’s misogyny, though more likely both are perversions of the true view of relations between the sexes. 2. phenakistiscope — first device for viewing animated images, consisting of a revolving disc with distinct illustrations that appeared in motion …
Friday Vocabulary
1. frowsty — musty, hot and stuffy I knelt by the bed the better to hear his wispy words and tried to ignore the sickbed stench in the frowsty attic room. 2. hoick — (colloquial) to pull or lift up with a jerk Uncle Slim leapt out of the truck, hoicked my cousin out …
Friday Vocabulary
1. diligence — public stagecoach of early 18th Century, esp. in France I told the innkeeper to run out and hold the diligence while I gathered the soi-disant baroness up from the floor, along with her physical baggage. 2. bedizen — to dress up, esp. in a vulgar manner His green plaid waistcoat was …
Friday Vocabulary
1. pluviophile — lover of rain and rainy days As the storm subsided into a steady shower, Daniel looked out into the comforting grey sky and he realized how much he had missed rainy days, realized that he had always been a pluviophile, perhaps since he used to visit his grandfather in the little county …
Friday Vocabulary
1. steatopygic — having a fat ass, of or related to the possession of very large buttocks due to the accumulation of fat there and in the thighs and hips (esp. in women) True, he had been easily distracted by her forward protuberances, but when she turned around and began twerking in all her steatopygic …