Here's a deftly written sentence featuring quaternary in its meaning "of the fourth rank":
"To Fred Astaire, the dance was primary — his main story — and he had it filmed accordingly. In Michael Jackson's videos, the dance was tertiary, even quaternary (after the song and the story and the filming). The camera repeatedly cuts away, and, when it comes back, it often limits itself to the upper body. Jackson didn't value his dancing enough.
"Walking on the Moon: Michael Jackson in motion" Joan Acocella
I put verbal inventions into my two blogs whenever inspiration comes noncing. In the family blog, I described my new hobby of piling rocks on rocks into animal and human forms by instantiating the term "gerp":
"Quaker Hill's rocky terrain became fertile soil (so to speak) for my current hobby, which could aptly be called, "Rockery." But starting around 1835, the word began answering to the definition, "rock garden," and I don't do rock gardens. So I created a nonce word for the craft: " Gravity-enabled Rock Placements," which, as an acronym, struts into the upper case to become GERPs, and then, sans pomp, settles down to earth into the lower-case to become the neologism "gerps"
Addenda: multiple gerps in close proximity are known in the informal as "gerp groups" and in the formal as "rockcolonies."
I put verbal inventions into my two blogs whenever inspiration comes noncing. In the family blog, I described my new hobby of piling rocks on rocks into animal and human forms by instantiating the term "gerp":
"Quaker Hill's rocky terrain became fertile soil (so to speak) for my current hobby, which could aptly be called, "rockery." But starting around 1835, the word began answering to the definition, "rock garden," and I don't do rock gardens. So I created a nonce word for the craft: " Gravity-enabled Rock Placements," which, as an acronym, struts into the upper case to become GERPs, and then, sans pomp, settles down to earth into the lower-case to become the neologism "gerps"
Addenda: multiple gerps in close proximity are known in the informal as "gerp groups" and in the formal as "rockcolonies."
Comments by jesterpatch
Jesterpatch commented on the word quaternary
Here's a deftly written sentence featuring quaternary in its meaning "of the fourth rank":
"To Fred Astaire, the dance was primary — his main story — and he had it filmed accordingly. In Michael Jackson's videos, the dance was tertiary, even quaternary (after the song and the story and the filming). The camera repeatedly cuts away, and, when it comes back, it often limits itself to the upper body. Jackson didn't value his dancing enough.
"Walking on the Moon: Michael Jackson in motion" Joan Acocella
The New Yorker July 27, 2009, 77.
September 24, 2009
Jesterpatch commented on the word nonce word
I put verbal inventions into my two blogs whenever inspiration comes noncing. In the family blog, I described my new hobby of piling rocks on rocks into animal and human forms by instantiating the term "gerp":
"Quaker Hill's rocky terrain became fertile soil (so to speak) for my current hobby, which could aptly be called, "Rockery." But starting around 1835, the word began answering to the definition, "rock garden," and I don't do rock gardens. So I created a nonce word for the craft: " Gravity-enabled Rock Placements," which, as an acronym, struts into the upper case to become GERPs, and then, sans pomp, settles down to earth into the lower-case to become the neologism "gerps"
Addenda: multiple gerps in close proximity are known in the informal as "gerp groups" and in the formal as "rockcolonies."
September 29, 2007
Jesterpatch commented on the word nonce word
I put verbal inventions into my two blogs whenever inspiration comes noncing. In the family blog, I described my new hobby of piling rocks on rocks into animal and human forms by instantiating the term "gerp":
"Quaker Hill's rocky terrain became fertile soil (so to speak) for my current hobby, which could aptly be called, "rockery." But starting around 1835, the word began answering to the definition, "rock garden," and I don't do rock gardens. So I created a nonce word for the craft: " Gravity-enabled Rock Placements," which, as an acronym, struts into the upper case to become GERPs, and then, sans pomp, settles down to earth into the lower-case to become the neologism "gerps"
Addenda: multiple gerps in close proximity are known in the informal as "gerp groups" and in the formal as "rockcolonies."
September 29, 2007