Word of the Day

[Katya]

teknonymy - The practice of referring to parents by the names of their children. (I.e., after your first child is born, your name becomes X's Mom or X's Dad.)

Cool! This is sometimes done in Tanzania but I didn't know there was a name for it!

Yeah, I came across the word in an anthropology book and was delighted to learn about the concept, as well as the name. (To be fair, a friend of mine pointed out to me that we sometimes do this in American culture, like if you visit your child's school you may be referred to as X's Mom, as well as little kids calling you X's Mom when they don't know your actual name. But it's certainly not a formal name, in our culture.)

[Yarjka]

(To be fair, a friend of mine pointed out to me that we sometimes do this in American culture, like if you visit your child's school you may be referred to as X's Mom, as well as little kids calling you X's Mom when they don't know your actual name. But it's certainly not a formal name, in our culture.)

Like Eugene Levy's character in the American Pie movies is known by everyone as simply "Jim's Dad."

[Katya]

uxorious - having or showing an excessive or submissive fondness for one's wife

[Portia]

(To be fair, a friend of mine pointed out to me that we sometimes do this in American culture, like if you visit your child's school you may be referred to as X's Mom, as well as little kids calling you X's Mom when they don't know your actual name. But it's certainly not a formal name, in our culture.)

Like Eugene Levy's character in the American Pie movies is known by everyone as simply "Jim's Dad."

Stacy's Mom has got it goin' on.

[Katya]

skep - a straw or wicker beehive. (This is the type of beehive that shows up on the Utah state flag, etc.)

[Katya]

petit bleu - a telegram, or any note sent by pneumatic tube

(I'm putting this word here and not in mot du jour because I encountered the word in an English-language article.)

[Katya]

rebarbative - unattractive and objectionable.

[Katya]

prelapsarian - characteristic of the time before the Fall of Man; innocent and unspoiled

[Marduk]

prelapsarian - characteristic of the time before the Fall of Man; innocent and unspoiled

I just learned this word in my Milton class the other day!

[Katya]

prelapsarian - characteristic of the time before the Fall of Man; innocent and unspoiled

I just learned this word in my Milton class the other day!

Did Milton use it, then?

[Katya]

deadhead - to complete a trip without paying passengers or freight

[Whistler]

borborygmus - scientific name for rumbling stomach

[Giovanni Schwartz]

quire - a set of 24 uniform sheets of paper.

Found when I accidentally typo'ed to someone in a text message, and it didn't show up as spelled incorrectly, and didn't auto-correct.

[Katya]

quire - a set of 24 uniform sheets of paper.

Found when I accidentally typo'ed to someone in a text message, and it didn't show up as spelled incorrectly, and didn't auto-correct.

I love this word because I once won a game of Scrabble with it. (I played it on a triple word score plus some double or triple letter values, I think. Anyway, it was worth hundreds of points by the time I was done.)

[Marduk]

prelapsarian - characteristic of the time before the Fall of Man; innocent and unspoiled

I just learned this word in my Milton class the other day!

Did Milton use it, then?

Um, not that I've encountered, yet. Just a lot of pretentious people talk about him using it and other words equally clandestine.

[Yarjka]

apodictic (adj.)
necessarily or demonstrably true; incontrovertible.

[Dead Cat]

En passant: a move you can make in chess where you can capture a pawn in the spot it just went through.

[Giovanni Schwartz]

I know how to do that! And people never believe me when I use it against them.

[Marduk]

I know how to do that! And people never believe me when I use it against them.

Ditto. Also, I almost always make the move when it comes up, even if it isn't the best move to make.

[Yarjka]

I know how to do that! And people never believe me when I use it against them.

Ditto. Also, I almost always make the move when it comes up, even if it isn't the best move to make.

Yeah, it's usually the highlight of an eventual loss for me.