Daenerys Stormborn of the House Targaryen, First of Her Name, the Unburnt, Queen of the Andals and the First Men, Khaleesi of the Great Grass Sea, Breaker of Chains, and Mother of Dragons is a hot chick in many ways. She’s on a campaign to take the iron throne which she believes to be hers by right. She’s killing a lot of people along the way. Her most extravagant weapons are the three dragons she hatched from ancient eggs and raised as her “children.” They breathe fire, as dragons are wont to do, and do it with particular relish on the armies of their mother’s foes.
We are only into season three of a saga now in its eighth and final season, so I can’t tell you more about how Daenerys fares.
Note: The reference is to Game of Thrones which my wife and I have just started binge watching. Since I assume we are the last two people on the planet to see this program I will omit further explanation.
Calling people “snitty” is a way of accusing them of being weak, mewling, and rule-bound, with a pathetic belief in fairness. It’s the bully’s retort upon being called out—expressing the same resentment that might, say, lead a President to commit what the Mueller report refers to as potentially “obstructive acts.” “Snitty” is used to conjure up the image of people whom one would rather ignore stamping their feet—which may be why Barr joined it with the supposition that the letter Mueller signed was written “by one of his staff.”
Sorry, zuzu. My mistake - now corrected. “Gobbles” it is. However, “gobblets” has a lot of visual appeal.
I am currently suffering from a combination of failing vision and side effects of chemotherapy that give me an an attention span of about ten seconds and short-term memory loss. This is a painful condition for one who used to make his living correcting other people’s writing mistakes.
My friend in Perth, a naturalist who often leads groups on informative walks in the wild, tells me that the label “snotty gobbles” drives five-year-old boys into hysterics.
Symbiocene – noun A proposed name for the next geological period, focusing on human integration into the environment, as opposed to human exploitation of the environment.
Thank you, zuzu. I could have sworn that I checked that Wordnik had an entry for melamine so I was dismayed to re-check post-posting and to find none.
My eyesight is failing and I have a literal blind spot at the right end of my field of focus so the ends of things tend to get mangled. I appreciate the help.
One of the nicest Swedish deserts is a big sponge cake coated in whipped cream and studded with strawberries. In my wife’s family this is called by a name that translates to “maternal grandmother’s cake” but phonetically it is “murmur’s caca.” This give pause to those who are first introduced to it.
Don’t make the faux pas of pronouncing Magdalen College ‘Mag-de-len College’. It’s pronounced ‘Maudlin College’. Just to make things more confusing, Magdalen Street in the centre of Oxford IS pronounced ‘Mag-de-len’ but lively Magdelen Road in East Oxford is pronounced ‘Maudlin’ like the college. Got it?!
Comments by qms
qms commented on the word exsufflation
Though demons possess our great nation
They’ll flee from the right exsufflation.
An exorcist’s puff
May well be enough
To drive out the orange abomination.
May 30, 2019
qms commented on the word aquamanile
There once was a crank named O’Reilly
Who lived life medieval entirely.
He slept with his dogs,
Wore archaic togs,
And washed with an aquamanile.
May 30, 2019
qms commented on the word longevous
For decades ambitions deceive us
Till dotage, when vain dreams will leave us,
But one shining goal
We may still control:
Becoming revered and longevous.
May 30, 2019
qms commented on the word bolide
She thought she could star if she tried
And see her name shining worldwide
But her star, though bright
Only flickered a night
A striking but short-lived bolide.
May 30, 2019
qms commented on the word incalescent
Some girls become addled in pubescence
And boy bands preside in their adolescence.
As parents try harder
To dampen their ardor
The girls just become incalescent.
May 30, 2019
qms commented on the word griskin
The butcher, his kith and his kin,
Know pigs both outside and in.
To please and to nourish
They carve with a flourish
And banish each bothersome griskin.
May 29, 2019
qms commented on the word babblement
The king said, “Let my subjects be mustered.”
When no one showed up he was flustered
He asked where the rabble went,
Their smells and their babblement -
The deaf wizard had turned them to mustard.
May 29, 2019
qms commented on the word chartaceous
If a baker’s to be efficacious
He must be both strong and tenacious.
Puff pastry’s a test
To challenge the best
To roll the dough out till chartaceous.
May 15, 2019
qms commented on the word antemeliordecrepance
Responding to bilby’s request at help and lost-for-word. See also improworsement.
May 14, 2019
qms commented on the word urostege
A scale in the bathroom can’t harm me.
To scale a small mountain would charm me.
But I get the heebie-jeebies
When I think of urosteges,
For scales on a snake do alarm me.
May 14, 2019
qms commented on the word brog
When the boy first slogged in the bog
He stirred all the frogs quite agog.
‘Twas a danger mistook:
The boy sought the brook
To hunt only eels with his brog.
May 14, 2019
qms commented on the word glabrescent
At times you accept, not assent,
For chemo is always unpleasant:
A body too thin,
A rash on your skin,
A noggin that’s growing glabrescent.
May 12, 2019
qms commented on the word makimono
Just why they’re kept rolled I don’t know
It makes their perusal so slow.
The style of their storing
May mean they’re thought boring
For scholars composed makimono.
May 11, 2019
qms commented on the word senectitude
Joe Biden is known for his rectitude
The goblin is famed for ineptitude;
But values aside
The folk will decide
Which man is less sunk in senectitude.
May 10, 2019
qms commented on the word eutectic
If calmness is hard, then affect it,
With practice you may well perfect it.
Though news, deeply felt,
May tempt you to melt,
Stay cool and be less eutectic.
May 9, 2019
qms commented on the word ambo
The Christians stealthily slipped
To depths of the old Roman crypt.
By flickering flambeau
Heard words from the ambo,
Piously ate and reverently sipped.
May 8, 2019
qms commented on the word geostrategy
The Donald has no geostrategy.
I wonder just what could the matter be?
Indifferent to ends,
He takes for his friends
Those specially generous in flattery.
May 7, 2019
qms commented on the word rhesis
Old Greeks in theatrical pieces
Might call a set discourse a rhesis.
But now it sounds funky -
A name for a monkey -
So use of the term today ceases.
May 6, 2019
qms commented on the word pentalpha
It‘s helpful to know where you are,
For Wordnik does set a high bar.
Pentalpha’s preferred
To a humbler word
Like everyone’s simply drawn star.
May 5, 2019
qms commented on the word deflagrate
Daenerys Stormborn of the House Targaryen, First of Her Name, the Unburnt, Queen of the Andals and the First Men, Khaleesi of the Great Grass Sea, Breaker of Chains, and Mother of Dragons is a hot chick in many ways. She’s on a campaign to take the iron throne which she believes to be hers by right. She’s killing a lot of people along the way. Her most extravagant weapons are the three dragons she hatched from ancient eggs and raised as her “children.” They breathe fire, as dragons are wont to do, and do it with particular relish on the armies of their mother’s foes.
We are only into season three of a saga now in its eighth and final season, so I can’t tell you more about how Daenerys fares.
To the world at large: no spoilers please!
May 4, 2019
qms commented on the word deflagrate
Daenerys will never her quest abate
While enemies still are left to hate.
Who earns that queen’s ire
Will face dragon fire
And watch whole battalions deflagrate.
Note: The reference is to Game of Thrones which my wife and I have just started binge watching. Since I assume we are the last two people on the planet to see this program I will omit further explanation.
May 4, 2019
qms commented on the word chemotherapy
I can’t say I’m really appalled
To find myself skinny and bald.
I hardly could care less
I’m pallid and hairless -
It puts off the day that I’m called.
May 4, 2019
qms commented on the word gumbi gumbi
Zuzu, your presence here enriches us all.
May 4, 2019
qms commented on the word snitty
A word of great current interest. See William Barr’s Testimony, and Reasons to Be Snitty by Amy Davis Sorkin
https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/william-barrs-testimony-and-reasons-to-be-snitty
Note especially:
May 4, 2019
qms commented on the word gumbi gumbi
‘Gobble snots?” There. I did it again. I really have not been drinking.
May 4, 2019
qms commented on the word gumbi gumbi
Thank you, bilby. I'm sure a few gobble snots will set me straight again.
May 3, 2019
qms commented on the word gumbi gumbi
Sorry, zuzu. My mistake - now corrected. “Gobbles” it is. However, “gobblets” has a lot of visual appeal.
I am currently suffering from a combination of failing vision and side effects of chemotherapy that give me an an attention span of about ten seconds and short-term memory loss. This is a painful condition for one who used to make his living correcting other people’s writing mistakes.
May 3, 2019
qms commented on the word gumbi gumbi
My friend in Perth, a naturalist who often leads groups on informative walks in the wild, tells me that the label “snotty gobbles” drives five-year-old boys into hysterics.
May 3, 2019
qms commented on the word galenical
The pot shop they say is irenical;
It’s products are safely galenical.
Its peace-giving herbs
Will soothe what disturbs,
And all forms of bliss are identical.
May 3, 2019
qms commented on the word seedtime
To cultivate hatred you need time.
And school is the classical seedtime
To plant in their heads
Resentments and dreads
That later will blossom and breed crime.
May 2, 2019
qms commented on the word clart
Sheer likeness gave Warhol his start
But abstract’s still state of the art.
There’s no need of skill.
The critics will thrill
At the beauty of your random clart.
May 1, 2019
qms commented on the word analphabetic
His hair and his skin are synthetic,
His rhetoric coarse and pathetic,
His thoughts at best vagrant,
His falsehoods are flagrant
And worse - he is analphabetic.
April 30, 2019
qms commented on the word fʊ̈ˈɫɔksʃɚ
I would be very interested to learn the name of a type of domesticated tiger.
April 29, 2019
qms commented on the word ecotopia
Sir Thomas’ enlightened Utopia
Was plucked from an old cornucopia
That these days is spilling
New dreams for fulfilling.
Perfection is now ecotopia.
April 29, 2019
qms commented on the word paleoclimate
I’m all for the paleoclimate
And ingenious ways that they time it,
But I’ve an objection
To this shrewd projection:
It’s a damnable challenge to rhyme it.
April 28, 2019
qms commented on the word griseous
Word gathering can be quite tedious
So Ernest, the evening just previous,
Decided he’d rather
Go drinking than gather.
This morning his face defines griseous.
Find out more about Ernest Bafflewit
April 27, 2019
qms commented on the word phenology
The changes are there for all to see
That poets praise as trite policy.
The seasons are rife
With the cycles of life
So whence comes the need of phenology?
April 27, 2019
qms commented on the word stuplimity
Indifference in awful proximity
To me seems but simple dimwittery.
This professor Ngai
Would beg to deny,
Perceiving a complex stuplimity.
April 27, 2019
qms commented on the word stuplimity
noun A feeling of combined shock and boredom.
April 27, 2019
qms commented on the word extratropics
Old spy films featured exotic chicks
Suggestively sucking on chopsticks,
Giving sultry side glances
That promised romances
Not found in the dull extratropics.
April 26, 2019
qms commented on the word Symbiocene
It’s Eden created anew
For plants and the animals too.
We’re perfectly green
In the Symbiocene
And live on the fresh morning dew.
April 25, 2019
qms commented on the word Symbiocene
Symbiocene – noun A proposed name for the next geological period, focusing on human integration into the environment, as opposed to human exploitation of the environment.
April 25, 2019
qms commented on the word sympoiesis
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
noun Collective creation or organization.
April 24, 2019
qms commented on the word bomb cyclone
We’re binge watching Game of strange Thrones
Which teaches no good work atones.
No matter how pure
The good must endure
A lifetime of cruel bomb cyclones.
April 24, 2019
qms commented on the word bomb cyclone
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
noun A type of extratropical cyclone characterized by high winds, a high level of precipitation, and rapid development.
April 24, 2019
qms commented on the word usufruct
You own all its practical uses;
Your portion is all it produces.
As legal construct
This odd usufruct
Resembles the old emphyteusis.
April 23, 2019
qms commented on the word spag bol
Is “spag” ever used apart from “bol?” As in “I’ll boil the spag. You make the bol.”
April 23, 2019
qms commented on the word spag
See also spag bol, common British slang for spaghetti bolognese. Is “spag” ever used apart from “bol?” As in “I’ll boil the spag. You make the bol.”
April 23, 2019
qms commented on the word sympoiesis
When each member’s offering ceases
The team will assemble the pieces.
Familiar and clear -
There’s nothing new here.
What need of this odd sympoiesis?
April 23, 2019
qms commented on the word defaunation
A woodchuck is in the foundation;
The walls have a steady rotation
Of squirrels and mice
No bait will entice.
The house needs a good defaunation.
April 21, 2019
qms commented on the word ecosocialism
The “et cetera” here is the key
Suggesting all healthy and free.
Ecosocialism harks
To much more than Marx,
It’s life as you’d like it to be.
April 20, 2019
qms commented on the word solastalgia
With age comes refinement of friends
As seen in the news that each sends.
It’s like-minded pals we are
Who share solastalgia,
Regretting at length the late trends.
April 19, 2019
qms commented on the word maculate
My night beast is more than he seems -
A tireless hatcher of schemes.
With paws clawed and spatulate
Coat rippled and maculate
He stalks my most unwary dreams.
April 19, 2019
qms commented on the word vermiculate
The lover of flowers affirms
That blossoms speak meaningful terms.
The message vermiculate
Is no less articulate -
The unsubtle sentence of worms.
April 19, 2019
qms commented on the word extirpation
Though thieves in office face expiration
Their penitence only earns expiation,
So history owes
Defiant bozos
Contempt and complete extirpation.
April 19, 2019
qms commented on the word hyperobject
I read but remain still perplexed:
These things must be big and complex,
But give them a name
And they stay the same,
No simpler as hyperobjects.
April 17, 2019
qms commented on the list specific-excrement
casting = the excrement of an earthworm.
April 16, 2019
qms commented on the word orogeny
Monadnocks are rather a prodigy -
Both orphaned and sterile of progeny.
Peaks crowded in ranges
Will undergo changes,
But these are aloof from orogeny.
April 16, 2019
qms commented on the word pervicacious
A man whose beliefs are fallacious
Can err without being mendacious,
But rise in defiance
Of that vile alliance
Of knowing men still pervicacious.
April 15, 2019
qms commented on the word ecocide
Despite man’s thoughtless techno pride
Our land mass sinks in a long slow tide.
Our noxious emissions
Have made the conditions
So ripe for the planet’s ecocide.
April 15, 2019
qms commented on the word fool-born
Does Junior deserve our full scorn
Or Eric the comics’ bullhorn?
Is it mere misconception
That forms our perception
Of offspring so sadly fool-born?
April 15, 2019
qms commented on the word scramasax
I rage at the telephone scam attacks
But words don’t suffice, the drama lacks.
I long to hear howls
From a blade in the bowels
That tips my emotional scramasax.
April 14, 2019
qms commented on the word iatrochemistry
Physicians expert in the humors
Looked into our stool for new tumors.
Let’s give them now clemency
For iatrochemistry,
A medicine based on thin rumors.
April 14, 2019
qms commented on the word findy
He sounded rehearsed and too windy
Like most other candidates, didn’t he?
Give me, I implore,
The full-throated roar
Of someone who’s honest and findy.
April 14, 2019
qms commented on the word tychism
When viewing the species’ sad state
I’m weary and feebly irate.
If tychism’s spin
Could give us a win
I’ll take it in preference to fate.
April 14, 2019
qms commented on the word latitant
Another goblinite sycophant
Unloading another bat shit rant.
If these are opinions
Of his loyal minions
What follies await still latinant.
April 13, 2019
qms commented on the word kriegspiel
New games have an authentic feel
And strive to be viscerally real,
With corpses galore
And fountains of gore
Replacing old cerebral kriegspiel.
April 13, 2019
qms commented on the word alopecia
Oh, fight like an angry polecat
But chemo won’t care about that;
Soon old alopecia,
That gaunt gallows preacher,
Will leave you a naked mole-rat.
April 12, 2019
qms commented on the word adiaphoron
He lies in a casual way,
A child who’s immersed in his play.
So truth’s to be laughed to scorn
And rendered adiaphoron
And nobody cares what we say.
April 12, 2019
qms commented on the word sangschaw
Old Abner cut plugs with a chainsaw
And chewed one before every sangschaw.
The music ensuing
He paused in his chewing
But finished the night with the same chaw.
April 9, 2019
qms commented on the word sangschaw
I will put it on the list. I get out of the hospital today and I will oil up my rusty rhyming gears. Medical interruptions may continue to occur.
April 9, 2019
qms commented on the word birthnight
As witches while stirring a curse might
The hidden ones whooped on that birthnight;
They drank until dawn
To honor their spawn
While moon men writhed in the earthlight.
April 2, 2019
qms commented on the word paralogism
There was a logician named Chisolm,
An expert at paralogism
Beset by the nemeses
Of mistaken premises -
Attracting extensive derision.
April 2, 2019
qms commented on the word vagitus
So many the threats that affright us,
What new ones will rise up to smite us?
With each plague forgotten
A new one’s begotten.
Oh, hark to its horrid vagitus!
April 2, 2019
qms commented on the word totipotency
God give us the gift of the wit to see
How laden with magic incipiency
Is each life begun
And warmed by the sun
At the moment of perfect totipotency.
April 2, 2019
qms commented on the word cosmothetic
He loathes any weak cosmothetic;
The solopsist calls them pathetic.
If the real’s but surmised
Won’t he be surprised,
Entrapped in the pure theoretic.
March 25, 2019
qms commented on the word blatter
There’s babble, there’s gabble and chatter;
There’s jabber and gibber and patter.
You can, if you’d rather,
Abide by plain blather
Or flatter the word fans with blatter.
March 24, 2019
qms commented on the word dulcify
The cat said, “The rules must apply!”
“Not so,” did the wise mouse reply.
“We’ll chase just for show
But you’ll let me go.
The household will prosper and dulcify.”
March 23, 2019
qms commented on the word roturier
When dressed by a brilliant couturier
A confident rogue may rule the day.
Celeb or new royal,
The skilled handlers toil
To hide any taint of roturier.
March 22, 2019
qms commented on the word horripilation
A horror flick’s tricky manipulation
Will interweave fear and titillation.
The body is stirred
By pleasures inferred
And chilled to a lovely horripilation.
March 21, 2019
qms commented on the word capsheaf
My snooze was light and perhaps brief
For rhyming’s a bullying nap thief.
But once I awaken
The word-hoard is shaken
And spills out the limerick’s capsheaf.
March 20, 2019
qms commented on the word emphyteusis
Your wealth is finally useless,
Your status is fleeting and bootless.
Be known by your deeds
And tend other’s needs.
Our lives are a brief emphyteusis.
March 19, 2019
qms commented on the word climacteric
The passage I’m sure is generic
And comes to each celibate cleric:
A mid-life decision
Twixt sex and religion
Must mark any true climacteric.
March 18, 2019
qms commented on the word biocentrism
The anthropocentric delusion
Deceives by hubristic exclusion.
We’d better envision
A biocentrism
That celebrates life’s great profusion.
March 17, 2019
qms commented on the word telesis
“How fitting that I should excel at this!
It cannot be chance, rather telesis.
The strong grip of fate
Draws me to be great,”
Said Donald while dangling o’er Hell’s abyss.
March 16, 2019
qms commented on the word circle-squarer
Thank you, zuzu.
March 15, 2019
qms commented on the word sordes
The king’s table manners weren’t nice;
His beard caught enough to dine twice.
The courtiers ignored these
Great feculent sordes
But not so his dogs nor the mice.
March 15, 2019
qms commented on the word Word
Because Wordnik is case sensitive. Check out word as opposed to Word.
March 14, 2019
qms commented on the word circle-squarer
The Word of the Day is the bearer
Of either delight or of terror.
Will triumph of wit
Or misery’s pit
Await this obsessed circle-squarer.
March 14, 2019
qms commented on the word deathsman
A boy could be hardly more blessed than
To know his true course as a freshman.
A student who’s willing
With talent for killing
Can earn a degree as a deathsman.
March 13, 2019
qms commented on the word corant
If a he and a she cormorant
Desire a deeper détente
There’s cooing and billing
Then, both sides once willing,
A brief and ungainly corant.
March 12, 2019
qms commented on the word rugosity
A quiz kid’s responsive velocity
Is a practical test of precocity.
If sulci are deep
And gyri are steep
The credit must go to rugosity.
March 11, 2019
qms commented on the word cyclas
With Christmas at last put to bed
Her costume was happily shed;
Then Mrs Saint Nich’las
Put on her white cyclas
And banned from the house all that’s red.
March 10, 2019
qms commented on the word squattocracy
Though many as felons had crossed the sea
The wise ones worked and got property.
So tenure and time
Erased any crime
And built a respected squattocracy.
March 9, 2019
qms commented on the word clerisy
It’s easy to thrive as a pharisee
But better to boast a small heresy.
Society talks
Of the unorthodox
And welcomes them into the clerisy.
March 8, 2019
qms commented on the word hedonics
The smart folks who make electronics
Have apps now to test algedonics,
So sybarites measure
Their portion of pleasure
In service to higher hedonics.
March 7, 2019
qms commented on the word dossal
The cathedral of John the Apostle
Contains a small shred of his fossil
And aft of the altar
With candles and psalter
A wonderful cloth-of-gold dossal.
March 6, 2019
qms commented on the word lithology
They’ll dig old LPs out of stock
To listen and endlessly talk;
Soon sober lithology
Transforms to mythology
When true devotees discuss Rock.
March 5, 2019
qms commented on the word malism
Our Puritan ancestors hail
The proof that their truths do not fail:
A heaven-sent talisman
Of obdurate malism -
The goblin’s allowed to prevail.
March 4, 2019
qms commented on the word soubise
Velouté, in some recipes,
Must mother a proper soubise,
But there’s little loss
In milkier sauce,
So bêchamel serves in a squeeze.
March 3, 2019
qms commented on the word infusoria
Oh sing out Hosannah! and Gloria!;
Surrender to springtime euphoria!
The world is new rife
With infinite life -
Great mammals to least infusoria!
March 2, 2019
qms commented on the word kepi
“Preppy?” The gibe is moronic.
A rhyme need be only euphonic.
Such nattering will be
Expected of bilby
And mummified buddies pharaonic.
March 1, 2019
qms commented on the word culm
Life ‘round the black mines took its toll.
Kids played with survival their goal.
To dig in the culm
Would sicken and dull ‘em
But yielded a few lumps of coal.
March 1, 2019
qms commented on the word kepi
The old organ-grinder, Giuseppe,
Employed a deft monkey called Pepi.
He gracefully bowed
At coins from the crowd
And scooped them all up in his kepi.
February 28, 2019
qms commented on the word aplustre
Now fitful and ill-omened gusts stir
The sails that once swelled with his bluster.
The ship of state drifts
And fades in the mists
From bowsprit to drooping aplustre.
February 27, 2019
qms commented on the word thermantidote
Air conditioning’s a sensible plan -
Does more than a swamp cooler can.
A thermantidote
Might garner my vote
If I can’t have a lackey with fan.
February 26, 2019
qms commented on the word Nettie Honeyball
Oh let us forever recall
Redoubtable Miss Honeyball,
And take quiet pride
In her valiant side,
A model of strength for us all.
February 26, 2019
qms commented on the word septennate
I’m told that our cells do regenerate.
We’re fully renewed in a septennate.
If I could consult
On a better result
I might have a body to celebrate.
February 25, 2019
qms commented on the word cenacle
Brainstorming should be ecumenical.
Diversity’s brew is alchemical;
It needs lively minds
Of varying kinds
Assembled with drinks in a cenacle.
February 24, 2019
qms commented on the word scabble
It pleased folk in monoglot Babel
To quarry and stack and to scabble,
But all their ambition
Had one sad fruition:
Sweet discourse was blasted to gabble.
February 23, 2019
qms commented on the word mozo
It’s true, and everyone knows so,
Mike Pence is a dud as a mozo,
But don’t you suppose
A red bulbous nose
Would suit him to serve as a bozo?
February 22, 2019
qms commented on the word nominalism
The patient would stubbornly claim
That things exist only in name
Till a wild paroxysm
Of nominalism
Established that “traffic” can maim.
February 21, 2019
qms commented on the word lorette
Be careful, insouciant Babette!
You’re pleased now to play the coquette,
But many a flirt
Has lifted her skirt
To trip down the stairs to lorette.
February 20, 2019
qms commented on the word algedonic
To artists whose gig is harmonic
Applause is an absolute tonic.
They notice its length
And assay its strength
By internal rules algedonic.
February 19, 2019
qms commented on the word timocracy
Oh, heed the opinions of him
Who’s wise in even his whim!
The world as it ought to be
Is found in timocracy
As limned in the wisdom of Tim.
February 18, 2019
qms commented on the word joyance
My solitude is an annoyance
But calls from my love give me buoyance,
And word that she’s wending
Toward her absence ending
I hear with a heartwarming joyance.
February 17, 2019
qms commented on the word optative
King Henry had no need to give
An order to insert the shiv.
He probably said,
“Would Becket were dead!”
But spoke in the dread optative.
February 16, 2019
qms commented on the word parosmia
There was a poor fellow in Bosnia
Who suffered persistent parosmia,
His organs olfactory
So badly refractory
He spent all his days fighting nausea.
February 15, 2019
qms commented on the word leman
You say that she apples your eye,
Your peach, your adored sweetie pie,
But “leman,” though apt
Will get your face slapped -
Too bitter a fruit to apply.
February 14, 2019
qms commented on the word perficient
The brown nose is smugly proficient
And lazybones barely sufficient,
But have we no name
For steady but game,
The student who’s calmly perficient?
February 13, 2019
qms commented on the word gloriole
The painter of portraits perceived
His subject’s most evident need
So gave the sorry soul
A golden gloriole,
Which Donald thought fitting indeed.
February 12, 2019
qms commented on the word pyramidion
Madame Speaker Contemplates the Washington Monument
That obelisk, dully euclidian,
Taught Nancy a truth non-quotidian:
There’s skillful statecraft
In giving the shaft
But art in the sharp pyramidion.
February 11, 2019
qms commented on the word ogive
Mankind’s fertile brain can contrive
Many ways to apply the ogive,
In weapons that will
Only threaten and kill
And temples to keep hope alive.
February 10, 2019
qms commented on the word mandrel
Buying means to give metal some shape
Beware of the practical jape:
Be sure of a handle
On what is a mandrel -
Know mandrill’s a bright-bottomed ape.
February 9, 2019
qms commented on the word dimidiate
Thank you, zuzu.
February 8, 2019
qms commented on the word dimidiate
King Solomon once had to mediate
A hotly disputed wee kiddy’s fate.
He brought truth to light
And set things aright,
Proposing the claimants dimidiate.
February 8, 2019
qms commented on the word copple
The eager new candidate crop’ll
Encounter a panicked estopple.
The engines of slime
Will waste little time
In heaping a slanderous copple.
February 7, 2019
qms commented on the word pontoon
Cohorts of bold coho croon on top of pontoons.
February 6, 2019
qms commented on the word cohomology
Damn! I’ve been using this to mean the study of salmon.
February 6, 2019
qms commented on the word edicule
Security forces have set a rule:
No backpack, no bag nor reticule,
And minimize talking
While doing your gawking
Inside of the sanctified edicule.
February 6, 2019
qms commented on the word penannular
A Celtic cloak fastener penannular
Tells everybody how grand you are,
And some chiefs more chic
Give fashion a tweak
With belt buckles big and triangular.
February 5, 2019
qms commented on the word engobe
Some schooling’s required by laws
For each one and every because
It’s there they enrobe
Our clay in engobe
To hide all the natural flaws.
February 4, 2019
qms commented on the word bewusstseinslage
Bewusstseinslage on a bun with mustard. Corn on the side.
February 4, 2019
qms commented on the word bewusstseinslage
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/Bewusstseinslage
psychology
: a state of consciousness or a feeling devoid of sensory components
February 3, 2019
qms commented on the word switchel
A fishing boat captain named Twitchell
Will end every trip with a ritual:
He toasts his last catch
With rum down the hatch
And gleefully ditches his switchel.
February 3, 2019
qms commented on the word vizard
The Nancy mask known as “The Wizard”
Is DC’s most popular vizard.
It easily trumps
The choice of the chumps,
The orange one sold as “The Lizard”.
February 2, 2019
qms commented on the word haver
See also comments at haverel.
February 1, 2019
qms commented on the word melamine,
Thank you, zuzu. I could have sworn that I checked that Wordnik had an entry for melamine so I was dismayed to re-check post-posting and to find none.
My eyesight is failing and I have a literal blind spot at the right end of my field of focus so the ends of things tend to get mangled. I appreciate the help.
See melamine.
February 1, 2019
qms commented on the word byrnie
A tired knight after a journey
Or weary from fighting a tourney
Will gladly displace
His hot carapace
And flirt with the girls in his byrnie.
February 1, 2019
qms commented on the word bellarmine
Adepts of the junk delver scene
Are scornful of used melamine,
But dream to have dug
A fabled brown jug -
The bearded old stone bellarmine.
January 31, 2019
qms commented on the word casque
On sidelines some folks have the task
Of tending a squeezable flask
And being alert
To give players a squirt
While still in the big football casque.
January 30, 2019
qms commented on the word idiographic
The wind-tousled hairdo fantastic
Has turned to a video classic.
Like the visual tale
Of the umbrella fail
Its status is idiographic.
January 29, 2019
qms commented on the word supination
Contortionist fees are a ruination
But skill clearly merits remuneration.
Pay moderate fees
For less expertise
And least for a plain supination.
January 28, 2019
qms commented on the word tepor
The Tupelo family called Pfeffer
Was stuck in a stuporish tepor
Till Mom started pagin’
Through recipes cajun
To temper their torpor with pepper.
January 27, 2019
qms commented on the word good-den
There once was a miser named Ben,
The tersest in speech among men.
He swelled his great hoard
By taking on board
The syllable saved by good-den.
January 26, 2019
qms commented on the word colligate
A conspiracy theorist’s first rate
At sniffing the schemes of Deep State,
Connecting the dots
Of devious plots
And gathering facts to colligate.
January 25, 2019
qms commented on the word seraphine
The word suggests music divine
But I hear a grunt and a whine.
Perhaps if you strangle
An unneeded angel
Heaven might sing in the seraphine.
January 24, 2019
qms commented on the word circumferentor
As Fortune’s wheel turns on its center
The wise need no circumferentor.
Your rising has meant
A fatal descent -
Let cries of the crushed be your mentor.
January 23, 2019
qms commented on the word quillon
A sharp tongue may silence a villain
And rapier wit may well still him,
But should doltish guise
Be barbed by surprise
Be sure that your sword bears a quillon.
January 22, 2019
qms commented on the word swinge
It’s sad that our welfare should hinge
On pols who will cower and cringe
And dread to lose face
‘Fore the almighty ‘base’
That’s herded by Murdoch’s vile swinge.
January 21, 2019
qms commented on the word philopena
The gentlemen dodged Philomena
(As you would if ever you’d seen her).
They never could trust her:
That ersatz nut buster
Was famed for her false, “Philopena!”
January 20, 2019
qms commented on the word obreptitious
See also comments at subreption.
January 19, 2019
qms commented on the word subreption
Two years of news and reflection
Regarding the Russian connection
Has still not induced
The foolish seduced
To see any sign of subreption.
See also comments at obreptitious.
January 19, 2019
qms commented on the word connate
The beasts have convened to debate:
Should jackal or louse bear the weight,
Or lizard take blame
Sparing others the shame
That Donald and they be connate.
January 18, 2019
qms commented on the word jean dimmock
carburetor
January 17, 2019
qms commented on the word faunistic
One weather chat characteristic
Is rather a linguistic missed trick:
Why rain dogs and cats
Not pigeons and bats,
A figure more aptly faunistic?
January 17, 2019
qms commented on the word tombac
Doomed cromlech
January 16, 2019
qms commented on the word stound
His voice and his pictures surround,
Like a pair of assailants they pound.
They stab and they wound
And leave us in stound
Then kick us when we’re on the ground.
January 16, 2019
qms commented on the word nobby
Could a name for “enforcer of law” be
More cozy than plain British “bobby?”
See “peeler” that was
Supplanted because
The cockneys considered it nobby.
January 15, 2019
qms commented on the word tombac
Thumb thwack
January 15, 2019
qms commented on the word tombac
rampant poppycock
January 14, 2019
qms commented on the word tombac
Carpal dog snot
January 14, 2019
qms commented on the word tombac
Vorpal wombat
January 14, 2019
qms commented on the word cephalalgia
I’ve rhymed my long weary way
Five years without missing a day.
Now rest on nostalgia
Or choose cephalalgia,
The price the obsessive must pay?
January 14, 2019
qms commented on the word lewth
High sentiments can’t hide the truth
That much of our lives is uncouth.
We desperately muddle
And struggle to huddle
Like penguins in search of some lewth.
January 13, 2019
qms commented on the word tombac
Reality’s under attack,
Each speech a stinging gob smack.
His gilt is amazin’;
It seems as if brazen
But even his brass is tombac.
January 12, 2019
qms commented on the word maslin
From cold northern seas to the Tasman,
And islands perfumed with sweet jasmine,
O’er endless bleak fetches
The transported wretches
Survived on slim hope and coarse maslin.
January 11, 2019
qms commented on the word sipple
An infant who’s fierce for the nipple
Once grown may be given to tipple
And if so accursed
Must manage his thirst,
Not guzzle but daintily sipple.
January 10, 2019
qms commented on the word mellophone
That's cool, man. Pas de problemo.
January 9, 2019
qms commented on the word mellophone
Though legal, leave pot well alone;
It made my backyard Yellowstone.
There Old Faithful spat
And frightened the cat
While a bear played a fine mellophone.
January 9, 2019
qms commented on the word galea
There once was a youth in Australia
Who slept in odd paraphernalia -
Wore armor to bed,
To cushion his head
A pillow was stuffed in his galea.
January 8, 2019
qms commented on the word sooterkin
The Dutch have odd habits, by Jove!
And sooterkin shows us a trove:
Just why should Dutch ladies
Be toasting their nates
Or want to sit over a stove?
January 7, 2019
qms commented on the word theophany
Some credit strange creatures from space
Or think that a ghost haunts the place
But don’t often see
The theophany
Made plain in a babe’s smiling face.
January 6, 2019
qms commented on the word beanfeast
The suffering drones who are seen least
Will say that their boss is a mean beast
But turns a fine fellow
When workers grow mellow
At the annual company beanfeast.
January 5, 2019
qms commented on the word swage
The poets of old made a song
With anvil and hammer and tong,
Now rap’s all the rage
That’s stamped by a swage
So writers need never be strong.
January 4, 2019
qms commented on the word chine
The barbering tar would opine,
“The hardest to shave’s the jawline.
The prow of the chin
Is easy as sin
But not the damned barnacled chine.”
January 3, 2019
qms commented on the list autantonyms
See ferial, which means pertaining to a holiday or pertaining to any day of the week which is not a holiday.
January 2, 2019
qms commented on the word ferial
The day of the week’s immaterial
Official, mundane, or ethereal.
You’re sure to be vexed
Without some context
When told the occasion is ferial.
Ferial is one of those words that supports opposite meanings. There are at least three lists that try (more or less strictly) to collect these:
autantonyms, self-antonyms, contranyms.
January 2, 2019
qms commented on the word year-day
It may be all rumor and hearsay
But true in a chillingly weird way:
The Kremlin’s thick walls
Hide banquets and balls
On Donald’s inaugural year-day.
January 1, 2019
qms commented on the word horologe
The crow of the cock was more cheery
Or the bell tolling bedtime when weary.
A lovely hodgepodge
We’ve called horologe
Gives way to Alexa and Siri.
December 31, 2018
qms commented on the word undertime
He mines his deep mind for some rhyme
And hopes he will find the sublime.
In fits and in spasms
He scours those chasms
Constrained by his scarce undertime.
December 30, 2018
qms commented on the word empressement
Our energies ought to be less spent
In making the past year’s assessment.
To Hell be it sped!
Let’s focus instead
On next year with hopeful empressement.
December 29, 2018
qms commented on the word Childermas
In what an immoral dark wilderness
Could infants be brutally killed en masse?
Such blasphemous crime
In ‘Great’ Herod’s time
Is subject and theme of our Childermas.
December 28, 2018
qms commented on the word Detention
Be quiet and give your attention:
Obey every rule and convention;
Just be a good Tassie,
Not vain or too snazzy,
And never be sent to Detention.
December 27, 2018
qms commented on the word appetency
If a boob should protrude ‘accidentally’
She cannot help what he happens to see.
I’ll give you few clues
As to what then ensues
But mention in passing his appetency.
December 27, 2018
qms commented on the word shieling
Imagine how lonely he’s feeling -
The shepherd immured in his shieling.
Forgive if you can
That natural man
For finding a sweet ewe appealing.
December 26, 2018
qms commented on the word magus
Oh, might some benevolent magus
With gift of his wisdom assuage us,
And bring us, we pray,
On this Christmas Day
Surcease from the sorrows that plague us.
December 25, 2018
qms commented on the word nascency
These days in their fruitful adjacency
Can tempt us to hope and complacency.
The new year and yule -
A birth and renewal -
Seem marks of a new age in nascency.
December 24, 2018
qms commented on the word curule
We save for those fellows who rule
The sturdy and hallowed curule.
Its virtues are spare
As a practical chair
But, my! What a really cool stool.
December 23, 2018
qms commented on the word pontlevis
A moat had its uses I’m sure:
It must have been mainly a sewer,
But when the pontlevis
That crossed that foul crevice
Was raised all within were secure.
December 22, 2018
qms commented on the word trental
He dreams of a thirty-day rental
But beaches and basking are mental,
For Ernest though poor
Just loves the allure
Of saying he’s paid for a trental.
Find out more about Ernest Bafflewit
December 21, 2018
qms commented on the word intonaco
It’s Banksy I hear who in Monaco
Installed a big fresco ironical.
At night it evinces
Affection for princes,
In daylight it fades to intonaco.
December 20, 2018
qms commented on the word couvade
Let all of us be on our guard
Lest judgment be hasty and hard.
Is it tenderest sharing
Or harsh and uncaring
For a husband to suffer couvade?
The definition supplied with the Word of the Day gives a positive spin to couvade but other definitions and examples are less generous.
December 19, 2018
qms commented on the word kymograph
Might science discover a measure
For comedy’s varying pressure,
A new kymograph
For giggle and laugh
To trace precise records of pleasure?
December 18, 2018
qms commented on the word pococurante
He can be annoying now, can’t he,
Accepting our treats nonchalantly?
In his humble view
It’s only his due.
He’s clearly a pococurante.
December 17, 2018
qms commented on the word colubrine
Is your ear befuddled or mine?
I’m pleased with the aural design.
The internet voices
Confirm my first choices,
But maybe it’s different in Strine.
December 17, 2018
qms commented on the word colubrine
We all crave a leader who’s leonine,
An image that’s noble and fine,
But something’s amiss
With slither and hiss
And leadership that’s colubrine.
December 16, 2018
qms commented on the word gentilesse
Grown tired of wealth’s mental stress
He worked and he spent a bit less.
He kept all he’d bought-
His houses, his yacht-
And honed a relaxed gentilesse.
December 15, 2018
qms commented on the word quatuor
You’d hardly believe it, just what furor
Was stirred by that tuneless loud quatuor!
Hell’s recesses shook
In every dark nook;
The doors blew off and bats flew o’er.
December 14, 2018
qms commented on the word visitatorial
At beauty fests times immemorial
He claimed rights visitatorial
And cheekily breached
The dressing room niche
As though he had privilege seigneurial.
December 14, 2018
qms commented on the word oxime
From the pronunciation guidance I find it rhymes with mock steam, but I have not found a true two-syllable, one-word rhyme.
December 14, 2018
qms commented on the word chorology
Just where might you look for a wallaby
Or find a big prairie dog colony?
What habitats boast
The least and the most
And why, is the realm of chorology.
December 13, 2018
qms commented on the word skopos
In the matter of Moses’s toes
Just what may the scholar suppose?
The text could be comical
Or else anatomical.
He’d better define the skopos.
Any unfamiliar with the matter of Moses’s toes can be enlightened at this link:
https://youtu.be/cQLnrBxVw3M
December 12, 2018
qms commented on the word cake
One of the nicest Swedish deserts is a big sponge cake coated in whipped cream and studded with strawberries. In my wife’s family this is called by a name that translates to “maternal grandmother’s cake” but phonetically it is “murmur’s caca.” This give pause to those who are first introduced to it.
December 11, 2018
qms commented on the word freshie
The forms of address can get messy
When croc and newcomer are freshie.
I’d stumble, by gosh,
‘Cause we call them frosh
And ‘gators are what might distress me.
December 11, 2018
qms commented on the word fluviatile
Old crocs that are cruising the Nile
To Aussie eyes look juvenile.
They are mighty paltry
Compared to a saltie
And prosaically fluviatile.
December 11, 2018
qms commented on the list cookie-monster
The pepparkakor is one of the seemingly infinite variety of cookies my wife’s Swedish family bakes at Christmas.
December 10, 2018
qms commented on the word wully-wus
Ol’ bilby persists in his pranks
But, weary, I tell him, “No thanks.”
He may embrace fully
The wus and the wully
But my brief stops well short of Manx.
December 10, 2018
qms commented on the word incult
A young person’s mind is in tumult,
While fertile and green it is uncult,
So passionate youth
Neglects tact for truth
And old withered ears hear an insult.
December 10, 2018
qms commented on the word borrel
To set a tone lofty and moral
Some leaders eschew petty quarrel.
The goblin by contrast
Loves insult and bombast.
He’s hopelessly clumsy and borrel.
December 9, 2018
qms commented on the word empyreal
Some suitors use comic material;
Others are sweet and ethereal.
Some try derring-do
But the most daring woo
Is feigning the sexless empyreal.
December 8, 2018
qms commented on the word tramontane
Cf. ultramontaine.
December 7, 2018
qms commented on the word ultramontane
The still mists stifle and stain
Befouling the air of the plain.
Skies formerly bright
With reason’s clear light
Need fresh gusts ultramontaine.
Cf. tramontane.
December 7, 2018
qms commented on the word pandect
He’ll hunt and he’ll peck to collect,
To source, classify and connect,
But Ernest’s best hope is
An eccentric opus.
He’ll never compose a pandect.
Find out more about Ernest Bafflewit
December 6, 2018
qms commented on the word catadromous
*Doffs his hat.*
December 5, 2018
qms commented on the word catadromous
It’s deep sea that makes a shad amorous
But love misapplied is calamitous.
How bad must she feel
To fall for an eel
Then learn that her lover’s catadromous.
December 5, 2018
qms commented on the word zambomba
While some play the spoons or the bones
Let others percuss with two stones,
Or add a zambomba
And cry ¡Ay,caramba!
Enriching the idiophones.
December 4, 2018
qms commented on the word incondite
The flourish too much was the bonnet;
Mugs curses the moment he donned it.
The cops on the hunt
Could see through his stunt;
His costume was sadly incondite.
December 3, 2018
qms commented on the word boistous
I prithee, begone! Thou annoyeth us,
Profaning these sanctified cloisters.
A monk should be meek
And hark more than speak
But thou stealeth ale and are boistous.
December 2, 2018
qms commented on the word gentilitial
His statements, both tweets and official,
Give proof of a grave mental issue.
His dad joined the Klan
And formed the young man
So call it a trait gentilitial.
December 1, 2018
qms commented on the word lapstone
Fresh leather, uneven and knobbled,
Must always be thoroughly cobbled,
But whacking on lapstones
Is hard on a chap’s bones
And prospects of offspring are hobbled.
November 30, 2018
qms commented on the word spaghett
This pasta, I think you will find,
Accepts sauce of most any kind.
She’s not a cheap floozy
Yet cannot be choosy
For, i-less, spaghett is thus blind.
November 30, 2018
qms commented on the word kylix
Penelope’s dining is stylish:
A dainty and well-seasoned dry mix
In a Baccarat bowl
That’s food for the soul
And catnip infusion en kylix.
November 29, 2018
qms commented on the word jasey
The customs of England amaze me.
Their judges wear gowns and a jasey.
Has no one there twigged
They’re strangely bewigged
Considering wiggy means crazy?
November 28, 2018
qms commented on the word spaghett
It’s countless the pastas I’ve met:
Farfalle, linguini and yet
From out all the many,
The orzo and penne,
The noblest is humble spaghett!
November 27, 2018
qms commented on the word spaghett
In Venice the portly Geppetto
Near capsized a small vaporetto.
Resolved to get thinner
He had for his dinner
A polpetta bewreathed in spaghetto.
November 27, 2018
qms commented on the word stithy
A remarkable archaeological achievement, bilby. Also reminds me why I don’t want to be a fisherman.
November 27, 2018
qms commented on the word stithy
Poetasters flog wits with a withy
To beat out some words that are pithy,
Or bellow in time
To the hammer of rhyme,
Forging lines on the limerick’s stithy.
November 27, 2018
qms commented on the word trudgen
The hunk at the neighborhood lido
Swims freestyle and wears a tight speedo,
But for the curmudgeon
It’s trunks and the trudgen
To show that he’s conquered libido.
November 26, 2018
qms commented on the word tapotement
Priscilla, provisioned for hope, went
Again for light strokes and tapotement.
Should charm not procure
A willing masseur
Her checkbook might lead to elopement.
November 25, 2018
qms commented on the word siffle
Don’t go to the doc with a sniffle;
She’ll warn of an ominous siffle.
A cough and a sneeze
Are not real disease.
Avoid all that medical piffle.
November 24, 2018
qms commented on the word pandowdy
I just never know which ones are going to tickle people. Thank you both.
November 23, 2018
qms commented on the word pandowdy
That cowpoke’s so terribly loud he
Quite shook the whole house with his “Howdy!”
From force of his yell
My wife’s soufflée fell.
We served it as apple pandowdy.
November 23, 2018
qms commented on the word cocozelle
Said Winchell to Howard Cosell,
“Have you ever had cocozelle?”
Retorted young Howard,
“I am not empowered,
To say more than that I know her well.”
November 22, 2018
qms commented on the word sangaree
In isles of the mangrove and manatee
Swamp fevers can bring on insanity.
To shelter your senses
The best of defenses
Is glass after glass of sweet sanagree.
November 21, 2018
qms commented on the word parvitude
The fingers are pale as a larval brood
And squirm like slick worms that are starved for food.
But goblin’s do jabbing
And coarse pussy grabbing,
More foul for insinuant parvitude.
November 20, 2018
qms commented on the word ventosity
He’s not much at subtle philosophy
And stranger to grace, wit or prosody,
But his vulgar sallies
Do gin up his rallies.
He’s champ when it comes to ventosity.
November 19, 2018
qms commented on the word contumely
I desperately hope and assume he
Will go before night fears consume me,
And take from the scene
His strut and his preen,
His self-praise and raging contumely.
November 18, 2018
qms commented on the word shadoof
The pyramids furnish the proof
We need but the hand and the hoof,
For camel and manpower
Built every grand tower,
Assisted by levers, the sledge and shadoof.
November 17, 2018
qms commented on the word disselboom
The shopkeeper cheerfully mocks
The way that the Boer farmer talks.
He’ll give him a thistle bloom
When he wants a disselboom
To hitch up his weary old ox.
November 16, 2018
qms commented on the word berimbau
Yep. I’m wired.
November 15, 2018
qms commented on the word berimbau
The dancer with all limbs akimbo
Contorts in a lithesome low limbo.
In firelight flesh glistens
And all the world listens
To the beat of the haunting berimbau.
November 15, 2018
qms commented on the word garth
In seasons when sunlight is sparse
The Princess stays in by the hearth.
When Winter is gone
And sun soaks the lawn
Her court will disport on the garth.
November 14, 2018
qms commented on the word freakshake
Brilliant, bilby! Can you copyright a dance move? Shall we race to the patent office? Gimme, gimme, gimme some money for that shimmy.
November 13, 2018
qms commented on the word alestake
I guessed it was old Abenaki
Or maybe a rare type of sake,
But alestake is pure
Plain English for sure
And none of that furrin malarkey.
November 13, 2018
qms commented on the word alestake
When travelers and steeds need a break
There’s thirst of the horses to slake,
But coachmen will push
To the welcoming bush
And go till they find an alestake.
November 13, 2018
qms commented on the word lingcod
On the Great Puget Sound Octopus Survey
Beware what the scholars purvey!
Octopuses are coy in their way.
They’re dodgers and dancers,
You can’t trust their answers.
Who knows how they’ll twist a survey?
November 12, 2018
qms commented on the word illation
Concerning our great tribulation
I offer a hopeful illation:
The problem derives
From imbibing lies
And abstinence ends pixilation.
November 12, 2018
qms commented on the word demyship
If I were more learned and polished
I’d know how to say “Magdalen College.”
Odd words likes demyship
Would trip light from my lip
And all would admire my knowledge.
An interesting note on local pronunciation:
http://www.weeklyhome.com/blog/mistakes-not-make-when-you-visit-oxford.html
November 11, 2018
qms commented on the user sionnach
It’s strange prey the bandicoot stalks.
A sionnach, I learned, is a fox.
It’s not like he will be
A pal to a bilby.
He’ll eat him like bagels and lox.
November 10, 2018
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