Friday Vocabulary

1. mim — [Scots & British] demure, primly reticent, pretentiously shy

Alice sat there hands folded in her lap, mim as can be, though now I know that even then she was scheming to foil all our plans and triumph by our ruin.

 

2. compossible — not inconsistent with some other assertion

As we feel our way towards the truth of things, I will only notice now that Danica’s claim was compossible with the officer’s testimony, if we allow for their different situations, the lighting and the fact that she saw the incident through the leaves of the beech trees.

 

3. mangel-wurzel (also mangelwurzel) — fodder beet

“I’d make a terrible yeoman farmer; I don’t know a mangel-wurzel from a mangonel.”

 

4. cellarage — area or space of a cellar; rent for use of cellar space

Prices were astronomical at that time, and he could afford not an apartment, but the merest cellarage, paying hundreds of dollars a month for space not twenty-five square feet, with a sloping dirt floor which was damp in the winter and bug-ridden in the summer.

 

5. argand — argand lamp, improved oil lamp developed in 18th Century by Aimé Argand

The introduction of the argand to U.S. lighthouses had the unfortunate consequence of delaying the adoption of the Fresnel lens.

 

6. stravaig — [Scots] to stroll, to walk about with no particular purpose

Willie was stravaiging along the path leading to the fen when he spied the parson up on the rise.

 

7. gilver — [Manx] gillyflower

The path was bordered by gilvers and fuchsias.

 

8. laloplegia — paralysis of speech organs

Without the botox treatment, the throat becomes more and more constricted and talking becomes increasingly difficult until finally complete laloplegia ensues.

 

9. steatorrhea — abnormal presence of fat in stool

Any steatorrhea will obviously raise questions of pancreatic function, though of course many other causes are possible.

 

10. carious — having cavities; rotten

The very bones of democracy are carious and just as foul a stench arises from the courts as from the legislature.

 

Bonus Vocabulary

(UK slang)

wooden-top (also woodentop) — police officer in uniform

“Well that’s done it, then,” he said, getting up from the floor. “Let’s have a couple of wooden-tops in to keep out the crowd and I’ll call the SOCO.”

 

Friday Vocabulary

1. plonker — [UK slang] fool; penis; [outdated] item of unusually large size or girth

“He’s nice enough to his friends, I suppose, but he’s a right plonker with the ladies.”

 

2. Dannert wire — concertina wire, coiled barbed or razor wire

The village had shown their preparedness by removing all the street and road signs, and by the long coils of Dannert wire some alert alderman had had strewn all about the beach, which surprisingly made that destination no less inviting.

 

3. parp — [UK informal] horn sound; fart sound

This quiet interlude is suddenly interrupted by a trombone parp that hearkens back to the band’s beginnings as a novelty act.

 

4. didact — pedant, person inclined to teach others

Jones was a natural didact, meaning that you could hardly teach him a damn thing as he knew it all already.

 

5. introit — psalm read or sung at beginning of the Mass (particularly as the celebrant approaches the Eucharist); introduction

The choir took up the solemn introit specified for this holy day and I was moved in spite of myself.

 

6. antihelminthic (also anthelminthic) — of or related to destruction or expulsion of parasitic intestinal worms

In this region it is possible that the antihelminthic properties of ayahuasca are not among its least important.

 

7. barmkin — [Scots] protective wall built around castles, towers, and fortified farmhouses

But there was a weak point in the barmkin near the mill race where stones had been taken for needed repairs, the hope being that the narrow water might be enough should the reivers return.

 

8. lalochezia — using vulgar words to palliate stress or pain

At times my neighbor would go out to his car in street and merely sit in it, not going anywhere, and he would scream f-bombs and other curse words for several minutes, perhaps not realizing that the closed doors and windows couldn’t keep us neighbors from hearing his angry imprecations, and then, hopefully with this lalochezia providing some relief, he would quietly exit the vehicle, and just as silently re-enter his house to attend to whatever unknown incident had been the impetus for this bizarre ritual.

 

9. czardas — Hungarian dance with slow start and frenetic finish

At Kis-Körös we were entertained (if that is the word) by solemn men in red fezzes dancing a czardas while the train engineers attended to some mechanical issue which was never satisfactorily explained.

 

10. cantref — land division in medieval Wales

Each of these cantrefi had their own independent court, although in the case of Powys some of the commotes took on this role.

 

Bonus Vocabulary

(US slang 1930s)

strictly from hunger (sometimes simply from hunger) — terrible, really bad, of poor quality; only acceptable faute de mieux, of a poor choice driven by imperious necessity

The little blonde singer was strictly from hunger, and I supposed that either Bill was tone deaf or he was getting a little something on the side. Maybe both, I don’t know.

 

Friday Vocabulary

1. sebaceous — fatty; fat-producing

The wound revealed a sickly yellow sebaceous sac around some organ I could not identify.

 

2. chlamydeous — having floral parts, either calyx or corolla or both

Ah what chlamydeous wonders! Would the rose smell as sweet shorn of petals?

 

3. histology — study of biological tissues

“I can’t be certain until I get the results from Histology,” he said, “but I’m almost sure this is a case of aconite poisoning.”

 

4. tummler — gregarious activity director and emcee at Catskill Mountain resorts

Baird was a perfect tummler, lively enough to entertain, yet lacking the talent that would have detracted from the headliners.

 

5. onager — Asiatic wild ass; ancient rock-hurling siege weapon

The makeshift cords were already beginning to fray, and the onager we’d slapped together might fire only two more shots, three at most.

 

6. parataxic — emotionally unbalanced; not in harmony, unharmonious

And thus it was at this juncture, when the collapse of his romantic dreams had left him in this most parataxic state, that the commission entered his office to render their final judgment.

 

7. pindling — weak, puny

If it had not been beneath his dignity to ride the donkey, he would have chosen that stout beast rather than the pindling mare that was the only horse available.

 

8. exsert — to stick out

So hypnotized by those malevolent eyes was I that I hardly flinched as the fiendish serpent exserted its forked black tongue within inches of my face.

 

9. disadorned — bereft of ornaments

And now that the lights had been removed with some difficulty, shedding needles all about, the disadorned tree looked forlorn, waiting now only for its last journey to the city dump.

 

10. seisin — possession or right of possession of land or chattels

The judges agreed that seisin did appertain, even in the plaintiff’s minority, and thus the status of his villein could be abrogated.

 

Friday Vocabulary

1. pants — [UK slang] terrible, of bad quality

“I don’t care if the whole village go there, it’s always been a pants pub with watery beer.”

 

2. dietrologia — [Italian] conspiracy theory, science of discerning hidden motives behind events

Everyone knew he’d been fired for stealing from the till, but Ben’s commitment to dietrologia was such that he remained convinced that he’d been set up, that his boss Remy had set him up in some convoluted plot to get back at her ex-husband, with whom Ben remained friendly, though in his cups Ben even alleged that his troubles stemmed from a conspiracy between both Remy and her ex.

 

3. bolshie — [UK slang] Bolshevik, communist; leftist

Even though the FBI had plenty of evidence he’d been passing secrets to the Soviets, the young physicist managed to emigrate to Britain where his bolshie bent didn’t prevent him from getting a position at Leeds University.

 

4. autofiction — blend of autobiography and fiction

And to think James Frey could have avoided all that trouble with Oprah if he’d just labeled his books as autofiction, though likely they wouldn’t have made as much money … which is, after all, the entire point of writing.

 

5. blazon — [heraldry] formal description of a coat of arms; coat of arms

By the time these quarterings had gotten to the point where a blazon might consist of sixty-four separate quartered shields, the whole point of coat of arms had gotten lost, as no one could determine what family was represented without consulting learned treatises.

 

6. anastasic — of or relating to resurrection

Perhaps her very name was responsible for the legend, though the many and separate anastasic reappearances of the last surviving Romanova made pecuniary motives more likely.

 

7. oast — drying kiln, esp. for hops

They uncovered articles of clothing—her shoes and a scarf—in one of the abandoned oasts at the north end of the island, but no other trace of Carly was ever found.

 

8. clothespress — cabinet or wardrobe for storing clothes

The fine wooden clothespress stood seven feet tall, which is the only reason his cousin hadn’t taken it with the rest of the furniture when Aunt Agatha passed away.

 

9. theretofore — previously

Such were the strictures under which the society had theretofore imposed a benign regulation of advertising and self-promotion.

 

10. gantlope — running the gauntlet as a form of military punishment

A 18th-Century manual for Prussian cavalry specifies that any soldier drunk on duty shall run the gantlope between 200 men ten times in a row.

 

Bonus Vocabulary

(idiom)

short arms and deep pockets (also short arms and long pockets) — miserly

“Don’t bother asking him for naught, as Mr. High-and-Mighty has got short arms and deep pockets, and will tell you he didn’t get where he is today by giving all and sundry a handout.”

 

Friday Vocabulary

1. stridulate — to make a shrill grating, chirping, squeaking or similar sound by rubbing together body parts (e.g., as a cricket does)

The latex body suits made the grotesque couple fairly stridulate as they writhed in the heat of, for want of a better or at least more acceptable term, what Will could only call their passion.

 

2. exedra — room or recess, often semicircular, with a bench or benches where discussions can take place; such a bench

Tucked behind the bench in the exedra just to the right of the main church doors was a small brown leather bag, which was found to contain directions about paying the money, and for all his vaunted awareness, Timmy had to confess that he had spotted nobody even going near to the recess while he watched during the service.

 

3. hypotaxis — [grammar] subordination of a clause to another

“You can’t just say ‘While I’d like to stay…” and pause and expect me to play fill-in-the-blanks to your hypotaxis because you’re too diffident to stand up for yourself!”

 

4. feretory — reliquary; part of church where relics are kept

He had stolen the medicine cabinet from the home of this most beloved author before the bulldozers came in, and over the years it had become a feretory for the strange miscellanea of artifacts he collected at book signings and other public appearances: a discarded coffee stirrer, a leaky pen, a torn packet formerly containing ibuprofen.

 

5. chevauchee — calvary raid into enemy territory

Along these Scottish border lands the tradition of the chevauchee—although usually referred to by the more prosaic term ‘raids’—was so strong that it is believed the term was the etymological ancestor of the famous Chevy Chase.

 

6. pung — one-horse sleigh

Somehow it didn’t seem as romantic as she’d imagined, riding in the pung in the biting wind as the horse kicked up slushy snow which kept finding the crevices in the scarf she’d wrapped around her head and face.

 

7. solfeggio — do-re-mi system of learning notes of the scale

Winston never learned to read music and even the simplified solfeggio from The Sound Of Music left him painfully going through all the verses to find which note corresponded to ‘a drink with jam and bread’, and when Marnie told him about sharps and flats he simply gave it up as a lost cause.

 

8. nefandous — [archaic] execrable, appalling, unspeakable

You cannot commit such nefandous atrocities and then return to me with a mealy-mouthed apology asking for forgiveness.

 

9. groyne (also [US] groin) — breakwater

The first body was found caught in the pilings of the terminal groyne, which gave the detectives a pretty clear idea where the corpse had entered the water.

 

10. trenchant — incisive, cutting, biting

He rarely spoke in contradiction during these presentations, but the merest lift of an eyebrow as a junior executive made his case could be a more trenchant blow than any harsh words might have been.

 

Bonus Vocabulary

(nautical)

slungshot (also slung shot) — weight attached to small cord used to cast lines from one place to another; similar device with shorter rope used as a weapon similar to a blackjack

These slavers would subdue the natives with a blow from a slungshot, but this time one of the pirates had struck with too much force, leaving only a corpse to be disposed of.

 

Friday Vocabulary

1. chuck-farthing — [British] game similar to pitchpenny prevalent in 18th & 19th Centuries

Lorson had the eye and arm to almost always succeed in the first round of chuck-farthing, but he flung his coins instead of bunching them in the second round, so was almost always a loser in the end.

 

2. incontinent — unable to control bladder or bowels; having no or little moral or sexual restraint

But the second letter to Timothy also points out that these self-loving men (which condition we once styled as narcissism) will thus be incontinent in all their dealings with others, as they care not a whit for any persons than their own.

 

3. dule tree (also dool tree) — [Scots] gallows tree, mourning trees where gibbets were hung

The dule trees upon which the men of Gilnockie were hung were said to have withered and died in shame at playing a role in such treachery.

 

4. whin — gorse, furze

Eventually Mr. Tytler fed all of his horses upon the whins prepared in this manner, finding prudent use for the gorse which his land had in such abundance.

 

5. whin — hard dark rock

In these hills the whin is always found in a layer above the shale being quarried.

 

6. thrawn — twisted, misshapen; perverse, obstinate

But she forgave Petey’s behavior, telling all and sundry not to take any never no-mind, as he was just having one of his “thrawn days.”

 

7. madreporic — of or related to madrepore coral; resembling stony coral

But the bones had been weathered and fused into the gray sand as the shore retreated over the centuries, leaving only this madreporic ossuary to bear witness to the tragedy that had occurred.

 

8. hap — [archaic] to happen, to occur

“Aye! and if so it once happed it may well hap again.”

 

9. blackavised (also black-avised, black-a-viced, blackavized, blackaviced) — swarthy, having a dark complexion

But this blackavised jongleur was quite content to play the minor parts in these rural hamlets.

 

10. withindoors (also within-doors) — [obsolete] indoors, into or inside a house

These hair decorations are only revealed withindoors, however, for the tribe believes that evil sky spirits will be jealous of the bizarre decorations and would plague or even slay the wearer in consequence.

 

Bonus Vocabulary

(Norse mythology)

Fimbulwinter — the harsh three years long summerless winter which precedes the end of the world

The barn door was frozen shut tightly in place as if held in Fimbulwinter‘s icy doomed grasp.

 

1400 Books

Kindly readers of this blog will know that I’ve been tracking my books in a database provided by my lovely (and talented!) wife many years ago. And that I’ve been numbering the books read in that same software. And, additionally, that I have some strange scruple by which I don’t count comic books (and graphic novels) against the total number of books read. And that I recently gave you all the deets on the last tranche of a hundred books read, viz., those up to Book #1300.

As I intimated in that last report, I finished my 1400th book read in my silly book tracking project just shortly after giving you that full listing of the hundred books read previously (#s 1201-1300). Indeed, a mere three days after I’d published the “Book List: 1300 Books” listing detailing my poor reading habits for the previous century (of books), I hit Book #1400 in the aforementioned silly database project. The wonderful tome which saw me pass another fictional finish line? The supposed first entry in the Hank Janson series, Kill Her With Passion, supposedly written by Hank Janson. I advisedly say ‘supposed’ and ‘supposedly’ here because I find from the Interwebs that this Gold Star Book from 1963 is really only one of hundreds written under the ‘Hank Janson’ imprimatur, and is by no means the first. (In fact, it appears that this title is somewhere around #150 in the ‘series’.) I say ‘series’ in that last parenthesis because the Hank Janson character originally was penned by one Stephen D. Frances starting in 1946, and supposedly those earlier books by his hand were much better than the later ones written by house authors for quick cash. I can believe it. Kill Her With Passion is a very silly, throwaway little book, though it was quite fun. It is a terrible mishmash of hipness and sex, where beat clubs dig old school jazz in the heart of not-yet-swinging London, and a brash American brashes his way through a stupid set of murders committed by the stupidest smart guy in the business. A dumb enjoyable quick read.

And I’ve been doing a lot of quick reading lately, blowing through lots of short and easy prose just to get my ‘books read’ count up. Why? I confess. I bought a bunch of books lately, and am trying to offset the new purchases of which there are too many by reading as quickly as I can some others I already have. My goal is to be carbon-neutral, I mean, my goal is to have my books acquired equal to or less than my books read. So that’s why the numbers have gotten all weird lately, and that’s also why you’ll note in the full Book List which I swear I’ll get to you posthaste that I’ve been reading lots of comics. (Though I don’t count those towards the ‘Books Read’ total, they are included in my total number of volumes, so I’m reading those to help balance my (once more, need I remind you, fictional) accounts.

The first book of this past century was another entry in the fantastic Dray Prescot series, Delia Of Vallia. Alan Burt Akers (pen name for this series of Kenneth Bulmer) has created an amazing world in this series, and this book is no exception to the high quality I’ve become used to, though it is a bit of an outlier. For the first time, the tale of the wonders of the far-off planet of Kregen under the suns of Antares is told from the perspective of someone other than Dray Prescot himself, that doughty fighter thrown from Earth onto the strangest of planets were a man’s brawn and brain must constantly struggle to survive the dangers of bizarre races and deadly beasts that populate that fascinating planet under the double suns. The eponymous Delia of Vallia is Prescot’s beloved, and this story from her perspective is fun, with Akers (Bulmer) going up to the line in this anti-slavery tale. The frame story is shaken a little, but the result is a good one.

Mysteries were overwhelmingly the most-read genre in this last set of 100 books, with 44 read (45 if we include my re-reading of Hickory Dickory Death, which I originally read back in 2018, but we won’t, so there). The next most read genre is Science Fiction & Fantasy, at 16 books. (I’m including Stephen King’s Cell in this category, because though it’s gory enough for Horror (and boy-oh-boy, is it gory, I mean, really gory, gory with a bite, dang does it have gore), it has its SF elements as well.) There are 8 Fiction books read, and then little dribs and drabs of that and the other thing, such as 4 each of Religion, History, and Poetry books … though 2 of those Poetry genre books I’m including in Comics, because, well … they’re comic books. Speaking of Comics, I read 17 of those in this last set.

The pace was a blistering 142 days to read these 100 books, though this is in fact 23% slower than the pace set in the last century of books. If we include the comics and the re-read Agatha Christie, the pace was just north of 1.2 days per book read. Of course we don’t, so … moving on. The absolute pace of reading was also lower than in the previous century of books, at 186.6 pages read per day; or, if we include the return to a rather mediocre Poirot and the comics, 193 pages per day. (Compare with 230 pages/day and 245 pages/day, respectively.)

   1 Book per 1.42 Days   

I shall endeavor to provide you with the entire list of books soon, as I’m already up to Book #1440 in the newest set of 100.

Friday Vocabulary

1. mayhap — [archaic] perhaps, possibly

Mayhap you’ll find your keys immediately after I hang up the phone, but mayhap you’ll not, so I might as well come over to give you a ride should you need one.

 

2. smarm — to smooth down with ointment or grease; to fawn over

Babbidge’s hair was smarmed down to his collar, which of course was grease-stained by the rancid stuff.

 

3. soigné — well-groomed, fashionably made up

She was a grand old dame, and though her dresses were thirty years out of date she was perfectly soignée at any hour of the day and I daresay that even had a fire necessitated her running into the street at three in the morning, she would have appeared as perfectly made up as if she’d just finished two hours at her vanity.

 

4. twit — to censure, to tease

Margery twitted him for having missed her birthday—again—and he took her reproach in the spirit it was intended, asking if there were an ancient emerald in some distant land that he could bring back to her as amends … preferably one with a curse.

 

5. yett — [Scots] gate

Arthur rode through the grand yett for the first time, his chest swelling as he thought what a pretty sight he must make upon his chestnut charger.

 

6. decussate — to cross at right angles, to intersect

So they decided to decussate their crops so each could claim the bounty to father, Petey plowing north to south and Jackson planting his on an east-west axis.

 

7. clement — temperate, mild; merciful

When sober Papa was the most clement of men, and would forgive even a dire injury, but in his cups, he transformed into a veritable monster, and would find faults where none were intended.

 

8. cenobite — monk

But the desert fathers took this quietistic Christianity much farther than had the cenobites who sought solace in the forbidding wastes of this parched land.

 

9. casemate — bombproof shelter for troops or for artillery

Best practice is to build concrete casemates at the same time the parapets are constructed, though of course sandbags or earthworks may be used in the field.

 

10. ning-nong (also ning nong) — [Australian slang] idiot, dunderhead

“Oh, I’ll admit he’s fancy enough with that row of medals on his chest, and his title’ll impress the folk that go for that sort of thing, but don’t let him say more than two words together or they’ll see right away that he’s a total ning-nong!”

 

Bonus Vocabulary

(from obscure meaning of ‘cast‘ as a persistent turn, ultimately from the Middle English casten meaning ‘to overturn’)

a cast in one’s eye — the condition of having one eye twisted permanently to one side, the state of being cockeyed

Kathleen has a slight cast in her left eye which is not, however, unattractive in the least.

 

Friday Vocabulary

1. shandrydan — hooded chaise; old ramshackle two-wheeled horse carriage or cart

Now I heard the creaking axel of the pastor’s shandrydan and knew we’d been betrayed, for there was no other reason Mr. Goodfellow would be riding down this lonely stretch of path at this ungodly hour of night.

 

2. polysomnogram — multi-valued recording of an individual’s sleep pattern, including brain, heart, lungs, and limb activity

Of course it is vital while recording a polysomnogram (or PSG) that the technician remain awake and alert.

 

3. juggins — [British] fool, simpleton

He was such a silly juggins that I didn’t dare leave Rebecca in his care while I attended to the car.

 

4. trebuchet — medieval siege engine using a sling at the end of a counter-weighted arm to hurl projectiles at an enemy’s position

Vital in the action of a trebuchet, of course, is the release mechanism of the top lines forming the sling’s bucket.

 

5. flemish — [nautical] to coil a rope in a pleasing flat spiral pattern

After the blood had been holystoned off the deck and the lines flemished down, I took a turn upon the larboard deck, feeling how my prize handled and striving not to smile at this, my first command.

 

6. albescent — becoming white; whitish

The wood beneath the painted duck still had a rich red hew, but the window sill around the mallard had been sun-stained to a sickly, albescent gray.

 

7. myology — [biology] study of muscles and their structures

Harper has just returned from West Texas, where he’s much in demand as one of the world’s leading experts in the myology of cattle.

 

8. querulent — abnormally suspicious or complaining

Was this my once hale and hearty childhood friend? now transformed by the loss of a petty lawsuit into the querulent paranoiac I saw leering up at me from his crouch at the rude table in the far corner of the darkened room?

 

9. metic — foreign resident required to pay tax to live in Ancient Greek city states

Worry about Xerxes’ invasion led many metics to flee Athens, with a concomitant loss of revenue to the Athenians.

 

10. stengah — [Malaysian] whiskey and soda

“Well, ‘stengah‘ means ‘half’ in Malay, and that’s how Conrad uses it, but in this house it means a decent drink, chop-chop, because nobody should be drinking straight whiskey in this beastly weather.”

 

Bonus Vocabulary

(from ‘scrag’ meaning the lean part of the neck of mutton)

scrag end — cheap cut of mutton from the neck chiefly used in stew; leftovers; least desirable parts

That’s me all over—biggest jewelry heist in a century and I end up with the scrag end of the haul: diamond dust and a handful of stones so flawed that they didn’t even dare mount them.

 

Friday Vocabulary

1. dysphoria — state of feeling bad or unhappy, malaise

The marketing team finished their presentation on moving the Overton Window of dysphoria so that people at least didn’t feel so bad about feeling bad, but nobody in the room felt any better about the plan.

 

2. punnet — small basket for selling strawberries or other fruit

The strawberries looked luscious, and at $2 a punnet (or 5 for $8) the price was great.

 

3. runkle — to crease or wrinkle

He runkled his forehead as he strained to decipher the crabbed handwriting of his nephew.

 

4. petcock — small hand valve used for drainage or testing

After Decker’s pleas, the nurse opened the petcock slightly to allow more morphine into the IV.

 

5. ort (usu. plural) — leftover

As he was feeding the orts to the pigs, he thought of how the swine ate better than he, and he decided to humble himself and go back home and swallow his pride as well as his father’s food.

 

6. risible — laughable

The risible nature of their sexual congress dampened the anger that drove him into Milady’s chamber, and his hoarse demands to “Get out!” were accompanied by tearful guffaws instead of ire.

 

7. selachian — of or related to the subclass Elasmobranchii consisting of sharks, rays, etc.; sharklike

Madag favored me with a selachian smile and began to put on a pair of tight black leather gloves.

 

8. horse-coper — buyer and seller of horses, usu. of ill repute

Your typical horse-coper is well aware of all the intricacies of contract law as it relates to the sale of horseflesh, so any complicated clauses in the bill of sale should alert you to the possibility that you may find yourself with neither your horse nor your money.

 

9. spital — place for care of sick charity cases

The 15th Century spitals at Highgate were solely for the care of lepers, and of course were privately funded.

 

10. petrissage — deep massage using kneading motions

Henry submitted himself to the trainer’s petrissage and felt his shoulders relax for the first time since he and Ollie had stolen that car outside the banker’s garage.

 

Bonus Vocabulary

(historical policy of Louis XIV to reconvert Huguenots by billeting troops in their households and turning a blind eye to consequent abuse and thefts)

dragonnade — abandoning civilians to the pillaging of soldiers

After three days of this dragonnade the city elders returned to General DuCloit and asked under what conditions he could be persuaded to withdraw the troops.