Friday Vocabulary

1. transpontine — of or related to (something on) the farther side of a bridge; of or related to the area south of the Thames river in London; of or related to sensational plays of the 19th Century presented in the area south of the River Thames “I will not have your so-called ‘friends’ bringing …

Friday Vocabulary

1. grutch — to complain “If you must grutch and moan,” said the hospitaler, “have the sense to do it away from the sickroom windows.”   2. voile — diaphanous cotton fabric If you decide to use voile for the side panels, be sure that the fabric is fully mercerized.   3. haylage — silage …

Friday Vocabulary

1. jingo — bellicose patriot Appalled at Lord Muley’s quick insistence on massive reductions in the fleet, Sir Richard showed why he was considered the foremost jingo in the opposition with a long and loud speech of both hawkish and mawkish protest.   2. rondure — supple roundness; orb, sphere As they swung through the …

Friday Vocabulary

1. trunnion — one of pair of pivots supporting something; cylindrical projection from cannon supporting same on its carriage The bearings inside the telescope’s trunnions were manufactured to a previously unheard of precision, allowing the new astronomical wonder unparalleled accuracy in viewing the heavens.   2. okta — measurement of cloud cover equal to one …

Friday Vocabulary

1. doryphore — persistent pest, obstinately pedantic critic And of course Reinhard, the office doryphore, noticed that we’d had to change the printer paper, and that the later pages of the report used 92 brightness paper instead of the 96 bright at the beginning.   2. aoudad — Barbary sheep The hills around Hearst Castle …

Friday Vocabulary

1. lamella — gill of a mushroom; plate or scale of bone or other tissue The secondary lamellae arise within the spaces between the primary or earlier gills as those latter grow away from the stem.   2. syntagma (also syntagm [linguistics]) — syntactic component; arrangement of components producing meaning or a greater whole; phalanx …

Friday Vocabulary

1. azote — nitrogen Azote is necessary for most plants, though the form in which it can be absorbed varies; beets, for example, require nitrates for an abundant crop.   2. phlegm — sticky mucus from throat and lungs; one of the four humors of medieval medical theory, causing sluggish temperament; composure, calmness, apathy Funds …

Friday Vocabulary

1. raptus — seizure; ravishing, rape; medieval form of marriage by abduction Of course the most famous person accused of raptus is last week’s featured poet, Geoffrey Chaucer.   2. posture chair — office chair designed to support and conform to natural human form Ryback leaned back in the dark wooden posture chair which was …