CarlHoliday

Finally, getting around to reading Norman Mailer's The Naked and the Dead. Although there is fug this and fug that, fuggin this and fuggin that, there ain't one fugacious in the whole book.

Our local grocery store stopped selling Giant Size Honey Nut Cheerios because customers were complaining the ullage in that size meant the quantity of cereal in the box was the same as Full Size. The fact that Giant Size was selling for a dollar less than Full Size never came up until the complainers realized the new price for Full Size was the same as the previous price for Giant Size.

We can blame the French naturalist Jean Baptiste Bory de Saint-Vincent who in 1825 came up with ulotrichous (“curly-haired”) and its antonym leiotrichous (“smooth-haired”) for the purpose of human taxonomy.

Yeah, the Roman alphabet didn't have the J and the I often took its place. The J didn't come into English print until the 1629 1st revision of the King James Bible and an English grammar book published in 1633. I find it interesting when researching topics that change over time. There are numerous examples of someone taking something that is common today but didn't exist many millenia ago, and assuming today's truths were the same back then. If that makes any sense.

The 1st century Latin poet Martial says that ientaculum occurred between 3:00 and 4:00 in the morning. While the 16th century French classical scholar Claudius Salmasius (Claude Saumaise) says it occurred between 9:00 and 10:00. Frankly, I'm putting my money on the poet from Ancient Rome who enjoyed his bread, cheese, olives, salad, nuts, raisins, and cold meat topped off with a mixture of wine, honey, and aromatic spices in the wee hours of the morning over some French dude who went around using his pen name. I've known some Claudes in my life from a great-uncle who used his middle name, an Air Force pilot who pronounced it like those puffy things floating in the sky, and a guy from South Dakota who pronounced it as if it rhymed with "dud".

Denny's = pie and coffee all night long I.H.O.P. = pancakes and surly waitresses Waffle House = clouds of cigarette smoke and ashes in your eggs

I looked at the definition and picture and said to myself, “Aren’t these tidal bores that occur with the incoming tide on some rivers around the world?” Good ol’ Wikipedia came to the rescue once again. The bore on the River Nene (NEN or NEEN, depending on where you are along its course) had an Eagre of one to four feet in height. The river begins in Northamptonshire and flows 105 kilometers to The Wash and the North Sea in Lincolnshire. The eagre was eliminated with navigation improvements. The Trent Aegir is the bore on the River Trent, England. The bore on River Ouse, Yorkshire, is also called an aegir. The River Severn bore, at up to 2 meters (7 feet) is the highest in the United Kingdom. The world’s largest bore occurs on the Qiantang River, China, at up to 9 meters (30 feet) traveling at 40 km/h (25 mph). In the United States, the bore in Turnagain Arm of Cook Inlet, Alaska, is up to 2 meters (7 feet) and 20 km/h (12 mph). Some bores are high and fast enough to permit recreational surfing.

As the phrase goes, only in the United States (and until 1976 in Canada) is moral turpitude a legal concept that refers to "an act or behavior that gravely violates the sentiment or accepted standard of the community". Beginning in the 19th century moral turpitude appeared in United States immigration law. In other words, mayhem is a violation of moral turpitude, but mailing an obscene letter is not.

Tergiversate is but one of a whole family of closely related adjectives, nouns and verbs. tergiversate (intransitive verb): tergiversated, tergiversating to engage in tergiversation tergiversator (noun) tergiversation (noun) 1 : evasion of straightforward action or clear-cut statement : equivocation 2 : desertion of a cause, position, party, or faith tergiversatory (adjective) displaying or practicing tergiversation tergiversant (adjective) : tergiversating tergiversant (noun) : tergiversator

What a fun set of words that mean the same thing and follow a basic pattern: rampillion, rampillian, or rapscallion. There is a racehorse who's run in the UK and Mauritius named Rampillion I. But I think it's Shakespeare who uses it the best in Henry IV, Part 2. Falstaff's Page speaking to the Hostess of the Tavern: "Away you scullion! you pamillian! you fustilarian! I'll tickle your catastrophe."

If you're looking to visit a ranarium, there is one in Monteverde, Costa Rico. Except it is actually the Frog Pond Ranario in Santa Elena. Seems to be unique in being the only ranarium in the world.

I don't suppose any orrery could be constructed to actual scale.

That whore working the truck stop in Jackson will always be my kenspeckle of that fair city. "I'm all woman," he said pulling up his sweater and pinching his left nipple expecting me to believe that absence of extra flesh could be interpreted as a woman's breast. Plus, he didn't have the face, hips, walk or general physique of a woman.

From Wikipedia: The inkstand made by William Syng in 1752 and used by the signers of the Declaration of Independence.

Prior to the invention of the inkwell in 1854, there was the inkstand.

Marjoram and oregano belong to the Origanum genus, which includes 54 species naturally occurring in and around the Mediterranean basin. Both marjoram and oregano have become naturalized in parts of North and South America, probably due to kitchen gardens popularized in many DIY gardening and home cooking magazines.

On January 3, 1972, Henry Kissinger sent a Top Secret assessment of North Vietnamese hostile activity in Laos and South Vietnam to President Nixon. The President’s handwritten response on the document says that the result of decade long U.S. air superiority in Laos and South Vietnam “= Zilch”. He thinks there is something wrong with Air Force strategy and wants an explanation for that deficiency in two weeks.

Razzle-dazzle, what an interesting combination of words. Dazzle is an intransitive verb: 1) to lose vision when looking at a bright light; 2a) to shine brilliantly; 2b) to arouse admiration by an impressive display. Transitive verb: 1) to overpower with light; 2) to impress deeply, overpower, or confound with brilliance. It’s also a noun as dazzle or dazzler. Dazzle came into usage in the 15th century as the intransitive verb 1. It also has a bunch of primary synonyms and related words, and antonyms and near antonyms. Then there is Razzle whose primary claim to fame is the first half of razzle-dazzle. In of itself, it has no definition, no synonyms, or antonyms. It’s more of a concept, a feeling, an idea, that works much better than dazzle. Razzle is a scam gambling game of carnival midways and previously of casinos in Havana, Cuba, designed to take all of the mark’s money; … a British soft porn magazine; … was the English drummer in the Finnish glam rock band Hanoi Rocks; … is a British soft porn magazine; … was the precursor to the American rock band Lit; … is the fictional dog in the BBC children’s television series Johnny Briggs; and Razzles are a type of candy.

Both Oxford University and Cambridge University have Colleges named after Saint Mary Magdalene, although Oxford drops the "e" at the end of Magdalene. To this day, pronunciation at both universities follows the late medieval English pronunciation of Magdalene as in the adjective maudlin, "MAWD-lin".

Wrought iron, another dud word on WOTD. As of 12:26 pm PDT, only 32 views and 4 likes. Pretty dull as words go. In fact, a lot of supposedly wrought iron objects are cast iron made to look like wrought iron. As a side note, if you're into wrought iron crosses adorning graves, North Dakota seems to be the place to go.

I had an uncle (my father's younger brother) who was a bachelor. Lived with his mother until she died, and he had to find new quarters. Luckily for him, there was a nearby sporting goods store that had a "bachelor camp" beside it. These were (six or more?) one-man canvas tents on wooden platforms. For some reason my mother wouldn't allow me to get within ten feet of him, although my father let me tag along on infrequent visits. He never called me by my name. It was always "Boy".

The Spinster Stakes isn’t a bunch of gray-haired old ladies pushing their walkers around the dayroom out at the home on Route 3. Actually, the Spinster Stakes is a one and one-eighth mile Thoroughbred horse race for fillies and mares aged three or up run in early October at the Keeneland Racecourse in Lexington, Kentucky. The winner qualifies for the Breeder’s Cup Distaff.

Mosey is an interesting word that no one is quite certain how it came into the American lexicon. It arrived in 1829 as a verb meaning: to hurry away. Today, it has three definitions: to set off, to get going, to start a journey; to go off quickly, to hurry up; and, to amble, to saunter, to walk or proceed in a leisurely manner. Its origins are up for grabs: Spanish vamos (let’s go); British dialectal mose about (walk around stupidly); or, Ojibwe bimose (she or he walks along). Not a lot of sauntering there. Although mosey is attributed to have begun in the American South, its usage is mostly associated with the Old West, which would put it approximately 22.5 miles south-southeast of Childress, Texas.

The coyote is also called the prairie wolf to distinguish it from the gray wolf, which is called the timber wolf. When I was fifteen, I spent a few weeks at my grandparents' cabin in the remote Stehekin river valley (to this day there are no roads to there) in Washington state. I was roaming all over the forest and along the river worrying my grandfather who was of the opinion there were black bears and timber wolves around the valley who would very much like to turn me into lunch. Never did see any sign of them.

The original Mustang Ranch Brothel was the first licensed brothel in Nevada when it opened in 1971. This led to the opening of brothels in 10 of the 17 counties in the state. Mustang Ranch was surrendered to the federal government in 1999 when the owner was convicted for tax fraud, racketeering, and other crimes. The ranch was auctioned off by the government on eBay for $145,100 and opened five miles east at Exit 28 on Interstate 80 where it continues to operate.