m8eyboy

Comments by m8eyboy

• m8eyboy commented on the word potable

  I found it in an article entitled "Water, water everywhere" on Interactive Investor, by Ceri Jones:

  The solutions of choice are membrane-based technologies such as water purification, seawater desalination and membrane bioreactor waste water treatment which can turn alternative sources into potable water, as well as generating water of higher purity.

  May 11, 2007

• m8eyboy commented on the word mountebank

  I found it on P18 of William Bonner's and Addison Wiggin's "Financial Reckoning Day":

  A certain level of madness is often an advantage in the business and entertainment world, but this was too extreme for that. Purging the planet of ignorance? Only a buffoon or mountebank would say such a foolish thing. Saylor was clearly one or the other--maybe both.

  May 11, 2007

• m8eyboy commented on the word hubris

  I found it in a footnote on P 174 of Christopher Booker's "The Seven Basic Plots":

  Hence the true meaning behind the Greek notion of hubris, originally derived from hyper meaning 'over'. We shall look later at why the ancient Greeks saw the tragic pattern as one of hubris followed by nemesis. Although in the modern world the term hubris is often understood to mean a kind of cosmic arrogance or price (of the type inviting a fall), its derivation shows how it was originally meant to convey precisely that idea of 'stepping over the bounds' discussed here.

  May 11, 2007

• m8eyboy commented on the word burlesqued

  To cause to appear absurd by parodying or copying in an exaggerated form. Especially in a literary or dramatic work.

  From French, from Italian burlesco, from burla (mockery) of unknown origin.

  I found it on page 148 of 'The Seven Basic Plots' by Christopher Booker, talking about comedy:

  Later in the book we shall consider just why the Comedy plot should have come to be so widely burlesqued in this way (a parallel development can be seen in the fate of the other basic plots).

  April 29, 2007

• m8eyboy commented on the word sussuration

  Hazel and Pipkin are on an early morning adventure at a farm. They're alert for dogs, cats, owls, stoats, and humans...

  P.209:

  But beyond the light movements of birds and the first buzzing of the flies immediately around them, they could hear nothing but the continual sussuration of the trees.

  It originates from late Middle English 'sussuration' (current from about 1150 to about 1470) from 'susarrare', to murmur, in Latin.

  There are 2,580 instances of 'sussuration' on the Web according to Google.

  April 23, 2007