All Words
intr. v. I suppose it says somthing that I find this word to be highly amusing, and I say this with one raised eyebrow. Another fake Latinate word with a couple meanings: to leave hastily, die, or to argue.
adj. Rays of the electromagnetic spectrum are either chemically active or they aren’t. If they are, they’re the sort used by Terry Pratchett in his Discworld series, so you’d better get used to the word actinic if you’re reading his books.
tr. v., To present in outline or foreshadow; disclose partially. As in the opening to Alfred Hitchcock Presents.
adj. Foreign, extrinsic or accidental. Not integral to (something). Not to be confused with advantageous.
n. Combine the Russian words for incitement (or agitation) and propaganda and you have a word meaning political propaganda, commonly associated with communism.
n. Type of tree you’ve likely seen. They grow like weeds, whoosh! And hey, pinnate leaves… I just looked ‘pinnate’ up two days ago. Name means ‘tree of heaven.’ Asian in origin.
adj. or n. Whole fraction of a larger quantity. Until you take a bite, an apple is an aliquot portion of a bushel.
n. A rare substance added to perfumes. From where does it come? Well, you find it floating on the sea, of course, where it has been spewed forth from the intestines of sperm whales.
n. It has nothing to do with amphibian biology. An amphibology is an ambiguous statement, like ‘change looms.’ Also, amphiboly.
n. Social instability, alienation or purposelessness caused by erosion of standards and values.
n. Small covering on the backs of chairs. Protective against macassar oil once used for gents’ hair.
n. While a workshop might be found in somebody’s garage, or a studio might be crammed into an attic, and atelier suggests something more posh.
n. AKA whalebone. Comb-like appendages made of keratin, used by some whales, like the blue whale, to filter food. Distinguishes baleen whales from toothed whales.
tr. v., To make gaudy with ornamentation, as a Christmas tree. Example: The translator bedizened the novel with words like ‘calcimined’ and ‘limn.’
n. Ye olde broom, the sort for witches to ride, made from twigs and oozing with rustic charm. Also a broom used in curling.
n. Loop of rope; middle or slack part of rope. A bend, especially in a shoreline like it had a bite out of it. A wide bay.
n. A tummy rumble! As in… Those borborygmi emanating from your gastric region indicate a possible lack of sustenance.
tr. v. In 1818 Thomas Bowdler felt he could improve Shakespeare by cutting out the naughty bits. And thus his name became synonymous with to censor like a damn fool.
adj. A particular pattern of animal fur, sort of streaky, striped and spotty. Maybe even splotchy.
n. That wingéd staff encircled by a braid of two snakes has a name. The caduceus came to be associated with the medical profession because it looks like the Rod of Asclepius (snake on a stick), only gnarlier and tricked out with wings.
n. Have you ever wondered what a Mediterranean plant would be like if it was like an artichoke and cultivated for edible roots and stalks? Then you should check out the cardoon.
adj. or n. Inducing expulsion of gas from stomach and intestines. Apparently, a desirable medical treatment.
n. Film lover, or cinephile. Person in film industry. Also spelled with an acute accent on the first E, or ‘cineast’ without the final E.
n. Deep red, almost black, mercuric sulfide used as pigment, or that color. Also a red and black moth.
tr. v., To walk around something. You might circumambulate a mandala drawn on the ground.
n. A particular kind of coati, which are close cousins to the racoon. Notice the ‘coati’ part is three syllables. Also ‘coatimondi.’
v. This pseudo-Latinate word has some status as an actual word, having been returned to life in Tolkien’s The Hobbit, meaning, to confuse of confound, in the sense of a curse.
adj. Of the same substance, nature, or essence. A word used to explain the unity of the Christian Trinity.
n. A particular kind of plum tree or its fruit. Damson plum preserves are my current favorite, having beaten out black currant and apricot. Also called bullace, but why pray tell?
n. A crane on a boat can’t be called a crane. No. That wouldn’t be seamanly. No, that, er, be a davit, me boy. Arr. That be a good pair of davits ter hoist yer dinghy on.
n. In botany, splitting of a fruit or other structure at maturity. Adj., dehiscent. And some fruit are indehiscent.
n. There’s a good Scrabble word, dirndls. There’s a vowel in there somewhere. Alpine peasant costume, as worn by the fictional orphan Heidi. With its tight bodice and low-cut neck line, the dirndl is also popular in men’s libidinous fantasies.
adj. The music of a theramin steps up the scale. Fog pours through the graveyard. A gnarled hand reaches out. Quick! Now, before the moment passes. The word eldritch is just itching to be said, like eldritch forces were afoot.
n. A mezzanine, or a floor between floors. Like a large open balcony. In the warehouse I’m working, builders are constructing a three-story structure. It might be considered an entresol or mezzanine.
n. What others call others, as opposed to an endonym (or autonym,) which people call themselves. For example, the Finns call their country ‘Suomi’ and everyone else calls it whatever they like. Finland is the exonym, Suomi the endonym.
v. To drain, or be drained, of blood. Somehow it doesn’t sound threatening, though. ‘I’ll exsanguinate you!’
n. Pop anime theme song stuck in my head, I had to check the title, Fantasist Girl. Valid English or mangled Japanese-English? All clear, a ‘fantasist’ creates fantasies, as expected.
n. A volume of articles or essays published as tribute or memorial. Plural, festschriften or festschrifts.
n. Soft spot of a baby’s head. They have six which harden in a few months or up to two years. Also ‘fontanelle.’
n. Spotted flower with droopy heads, or a brownish butterfly with spotted wings. Flittering frittilaries!
v.To denounce or attack thunderously. To explode. From the Latin for ‘to strike with lightning,’ a word applied only to Zeus/Jupiter, most likely.
adj. or n. Interchangeable, identical, of equal worth. In law, one might hear of fungible goods.
No one seems to know what this word means. Could be n. a type of backgammon victory, n. a smoked ham, tr. v. fastening to the bow of a ship or,tr. v. to mislead with deceptive talk.
n. We need a word that means warm friendliness, said the lexicographer. Something, oh, I don’t know, something German. With an umlaut. The kind of word that requires constant rehearsal. How about, gemütlichkeit?
n. Also spelled ‘gweduc’ but pronounced like GOOEY + DUCK. The most phallic thing you could imagine, this large edible clam has a neck that can extend out to four feet. A Pacific coast native. Can live 1 to 1.6 centuries.
adj. Of a moon or planet, means somewhere between half and completely illuminated. Convex, bulging, humped, like and expectant mother’s belly… or my own for that matter. I have a gibbous gut.
n. Also, ghillie. A Highland chief’s attendant, primarily for hunting and fishing expeditions. Also a type of shoe with no tongue and laces above the ankle.
adj. Most likely, you want the word ‘bald.’ Okay? Just bald or clean-shaven or hairless. People know what that means.
n. A kind of metamorphic rock with large grains that form bands. Types include: orthogneiss, paragneiss, pencil gneiss, and augen gneiss which has lenticular grains that look like eyes.
n. A googol is a 1 followed by 100 zeros, and a googolplex is a 1 followed by a googol zeros. Not that anyone ever really uses the word other than to say, ‘Hey, do you know what a googolplex is?’
n. Theory of interpretation, mostly applied to interpreting the Christian Bible. Hermes, you may recall, acted as a messenger for Greek gods, interpreting their signs and omens. ‘Hera is displeased,’ he might say, to explain why your hair is on fire.
adj. Cool, man. Real cool. Like you could blast him with a flame thrower and he wouldn’t break a sweat. Cause he’s insouciant. Up on the tightrope having tea. Casual, nonchalant.
n. Slatted blinds or shutters. From the French word for jealousy. Write your own scenario for that etymology. Also a pastry with lattice-like top.
n. Before new-fangled pillow stuffings, like foam rubber, we had kapok. The fibers of the silk-cotton tree made for a good, highly flammable batting. Also used in matresses and life preservers.
n. Kilt wearer. Shoe with fringed tongue, of the tongue itself. I suppose it looks like a kilt.
n. A three-card monty dealer needs legerdemain, or sleight of hand, to pull off tricks like the Mexican turnover.
adj. Lens-like or relating to a lens, in particular a biconvex lens. I’m packing Batman backpacks which have a lenticular image… you know, those 3D pictures that move when you wiggle the page?
v. You take some lignin and put it in the cell walls of, like, plants, and they totally become woody. So they lignify, or you’ve lignified them, you know.
n. Pavemement of layered broken stones, often glued together with tar. Also tarmacadam or tarmac. From name, John Loudon McAdam.
adj. and adv. In French mal à propos means, ‘badly to the purpose.’ Inappropriate or in an inappropriate manner.
n. Geometric designs that symbolize the universe. As in the Wheel of Fortune depicted in the traditional Tarot deck.
n. A person who interferes with and ruins a particular plan. From the name of a character in a play by Susannah Centlivre (1669–1723). Plays often have a marplot or two.
n. Authoritarian, disciplinarian. One who demands subordination to rule or authority. From the name of a French officer, Jean Martinet.
adj. or n. Quick and changeable in temperament. Relating to the god Mercury, or the element mercury.
adj. Able to be mixed. Opposite is immiscible. Which is why the one chemist says to the other chemist, ‘Darling, let’s be miscible together.’
intr. v. OR n. To toil or churn about. Toil, or turmoil. Reminds me of my workplace. I like the adverb, MOILINGLY.
n. A hill off by itself without any hill-friends nearby. Also called an inselberg by the inselbergians. Don’t get them together with any monadnockers. Inselberg! Monadnock! Inselberg! MONADNOCK!
n. or tr. v. You think it’s a printing error, but no. A mulct is a fine meant to penalize. Banks often mulct their poorest customers with hidden fees, which is why the word also means to swindle.
n. A small nest, cavity where spores develop, center or focus of bacterial growth, or point where something originates or develops.
n. A cloud or halo of light. Somehow I think it should mean, ‘any idiot who would use the word nimbus instead of cloud or halo.’
n. The present or particular occasion. Also, a ‘nonce word’ is intended to be used only ‘for the nonce.’ Like… branosaurus, a um… an older person who eats foods intended to improve their gastrointestinal fortitude.
n. A word that keeps changing with the times. From The Lord’s Prayer to rosary beads, and then things which resemble rosary beads. Like fishing lines lined with hooks, and a type of open elevator that continuosly moves around in a loop.
n. A word much beloved by the author of The Tale of Despereaux. Means treachery without the emotional baggage that word usually claims. Perfidy never really caught on like treachery, cause it looks totally made up.
adj. or n. Walking, or one who walks. Also means Aristotelian, since Aristotle liked to walk while he talked.
n. Light, frivolous banter. I endured his usual morning persiflage over coffee and biscuits.
adj. I’m phatically challenged. Phatic refers to speech which conveys no information, but facilitates social interaction. Saying ‘God bless you’ when someone sneezes is usually an automatic phatic response, even for an athiest.
adj. Feather-like, with compound leaves spread out from a common axis or stem. Ends in one leaflet, it’s ‘odd.’ Two, ‘even.’ Adv. is PINNATELY. Furthermore, BIPINNATE leaves extend from stems which extend from a common stem, like ferns. TRIPINNATE, etc…
adj. Like a pinnate (feather-like) compound leaf, but the leaflets or pinnules aren’t quite separate.
n. also PINNULA or even PINNA. Final leaflets of a pinnate leaf, like the leaves of a fern. Plural: PINNULES or PINNULAE, PINNAE or PINNAS. Adj. form is PINNULAR or PINNAL. Got all that?
n. A canoe or dugout, or as we called them in southern Louisiana, a pirogue. Made by hollowing a tree.
n. A kind of spiritual energy, common in Chinese ‘swords and sorcery’ dramas. Now the Scrabble player’s best friend.
n. Pleat or ruffle of fabric to trim women’s garments. Adj. form is ruched. From the Old French for ‘beehive’ which is from the Latin word for a type of tree used to make beehives.
n. AKA ‘key fruit.’ Those winged fruit that spin on their way to the ground. Some are single, like elm, and others double, like the maple fruit.
n. A Russian metal tea urn. The apex of tea-brewing tech. Brews a concentrated tea you dilute with hot water from its spigot.
n. This genus of houseplant is totally Old World, yo. Mostly leaves which are usually thick long and pointy.
n. Flowering plants with thick fleshy leaves, used in gardens. Most have the common name ‘stonecrop’. Belongs to the Crassulaceae, or orpine family.
n. A harem of the nth degree, or generally the palace (or serai) of a sultan, who might conceivably have a harem.
n. Pronuncuiation, word, custom or practice which identifies you with a particular group. Hebrew word used in Old Testement to identify a people who couldn’t pronounce the ‘sh.’
adj. Stellar, dude. Astral. Cosmic. Relating to the stars, particularly measured relative to apparent motion of constelations.
n. or adj. Take the word ‘tattered’ and add a few extra letters and you get a word meaning tattered, ragged, or a person in ragged clothing. A ragamuffin.
n. Any agent that interferes with normal development of an embryo or fetus and causes birth defects, or teratogenesis. Literally means monster-birth. Humans have become very good recently at creating teratogens. Yay for humans!
n. Also spelled as ‘terrain’ from which this word derives. Specifically, though, refers to an area full of a particular rock, or related rock formations. If you had a bunch of gneisses together, they would all be related. Get it? Gneisses.
n. A wonder worker, literally. A maker of miracles. Magician. One who waves his arms in the air and says whoosh. Wizard of Oz, for example.
n. Highly decadent Italian dessert with layers of everything: cocoa, coffee, wine, cheese, cake and custard.
n. Most people would call an ulster an overcoat, but, I don’t know, there may be some people out there who can tell an ulster from some other kind of overcoat. I’m sure it’s important to somone.
adj. Devoted to one’s wife, perhaps a bit too much for others’ tastes. But perhaps your wife deserves your uxoriousness.
n. Shaped like a worm. Please don’t use this word to describe an actual worm. That would be pointless.
n. A toast, or the spiced ale/wine used for toasting. Or a party awash in the business of drinking.
n. A hoity-toity word for worldview. And if I catch you using this word, your Weltanschauung will encompass my knuckles, your face and the rough grain of varnished wood flooring.
n. Apparently Germans distinguish between various kinds of sadness. When the “evils of the world” get you down, only German will do.
adv. Also withershins, which means counterclockwise, or more generally, moving in a contrary manner.
n. I love common words in uncommon configurations. A worldling pursues earthly pleasures. A word used by people aspiring to a higher calling who want to knock other people down a peg.
