cow-orker

Posted on October 27, 2019 | Leave a comment

Coworker is a funny word. It’s often misread, sometimes accidentally, sometimes on purpose. And while I love a good double entendre, in my editorial role as a professional clarifier I feel it is worthwhile inserting a hyphen to make it clear what it really is: cow-orker. Continue reading →

Leave a comment

Posted in fun, new old words, word tasting notes

Tagged , , , ,

vetust, vetusty

Posted on October 26, 2019 | 1 comment

Yes, I am vetust. I am the vetustest. I am wallowing in vetusty. I am vested in fully as many years as a deck of cards has, well, cards (not including jokers). I am perhaps a veteran of years, but only arguably venerable. Jag vet det. Continue reading →

1 Comment

Posted in word tasting notes

Tagged , ,

censor, censer, censure

Posted on October 23, 2019 | 2 comments

When is it sensible to censure – or censor – something incendiary? Can we not be candid without someone getting burned? At what point does inflammatory speech and the smoke of burning crosses make a more offensive incense than the scent of burning books? For that matter, what is and is not censorship? Continue reading →

2 Comments

Posted in language and linguistics, word tasting notes

Tagged , , , ,

fulgour

Posted on October 21, 2019 | 1 comment

This is your time for fulgour. No need to think it vulgar; it’s fine to shine flagrantly. Raise your rays and enubilate yourself. Let those prone to heliotaxis hail a taxi or hop on the omnibus towards your nimbus. All will hallow your halo; all will be effusive about your effulgence. Continue reading →

1 Comment

Posted in Uncategorized

Tagged , ,

solace

Posted on October 19, 2019 | 1 comment

The opening words of Brahms’s Deutsches Requiem, breathing in as a barely felt but well-needed touch in a quiet moment, are “Selig sind, die da Leid tragen, denn sie sollen getröstet werden.” In English, we know that line from Matthew 5:4 as “Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted.” Those who need solace shall have it. Continue reading →

1 Comment

Posted in word tasting notes

Tagged ,

stunkard

Posted on October 17, 2019 | Leave a comment

Some days lately it’s almost impossible not, by the end of the day, to be stunkard. However bright and chirpy you may arise in the donzerly light, by the gathering of the gloaming you are gloomy and ready for a cup or two or seven and a half of analgesic, anaesthetic, or liquor of lethe. Continue reading →

Leave a comment

Posted in word tasting notes

Tagged ,

fenester

Posted on October 14, 2019 | 1 comment

A fenester is a fenster in the fenestration allowing a finesse from the sinister finster infinity to the fine and friendly finite interior. Continue reading →

1 Comment

Posted in word tasting notes

Tagged ,

artophagous, creatophagous, euryphagous, lotophagous

Posted on October 10, 2019 | 2 comments

And so at last the weekend for the weakened trundles towards us as a languid juggernaut. I will take my small cool folding computer and I will do a little work in the galleria of the art gallery, and then my eyes will dine on artistic creations: paintings, sculptures, architecture, and spectating humans. The latest exhibition in the gallery is by a noted European painter, famed for depictions of luxuriant corpulence. And then I will head home to rest, and in the morning we will load up a car and drive to visit family and have an almighty long-weekend feast consisting of… well, many people like to have “turkey and all the trimmings” but we’re going to be having “Chinese takeout” and “lots and lots of it” because it’s “easier.” And there will be wine, and after breaking bread and sharing meat I am very likely to lapse into syncope on a sofa for a time while nearby pre-teens plot the demolition of the universe.

I am, tl;dr, looking forward to an artophagous, creatophagous, euryphagous, lotophagous weekend. Continue reading →

2 Comments

Posted in Uncategorized

Tagged , , , ,

nuit blanche

Posted on October 7, 2019 | 3 comments

Nuit blanche. French. Two words, one syllable each: /nɥi blɑ̃ʃ/. When spoken aloud, soothing. When whispered, like an invitation to something secret. It means, literally, ‘white night’.

How can a night be white? What if the night is never black? Is it a night in white satin, never reaching the end? If a night is white, it can’t end because it can’t become light. When dawn comes, how will you know it’s dawn? Is there any special art to it? Does a white knight appear? Is the knight in white satin? Continue reading →

3 Comments

Posted in word tasting notes

Tagged , ,

schmetterlingsaufspiesser

Posted on October 5, 2019 | 2 comments

I overheard a guy going on to his friend about how long Einstein on the Beach by Philip Glass and Robert Wilson was. “I get it!” he said with exasperation. “It’s about numbers.”

Schmetterlingsaufspiesser. Continue reading →

2 Comments

Posted in new old words

Tagged ,