Edifying Ourselves: Word-a-Day

Elizabeth Nowicki —  26 March 2007

I have a Word-a-Day calendar – each day of the calendar has its own page and its own vocabulary word.  But I am visiting away from Richmond this semester, I am packing my Richmond house and moving to Tulane, I am buying a house, and I am selling my house.  I am therefore very far behind on my Word-a-Day calendar.  I do not have time to work each word into a sentence.  If you devoted readers could work the following words (from the past two weeks of March) into conversation, I would appreciate it.  I would hate to waste the calendar by not using the words.  Thanks.

Edulcorate:  To free from harshness (as of attitude)

Adventitious:  coming from another source and not inherent or innate

Corvee:  Unpaid labor due from a feudal vassal to his lord

Occident:  regions or countries lying to the west of a specified or implied point of orientation

Zibeline:  a soft lustrous wool fabric with mohair, alpaca, or camel’s hair

Panjandrum:  a powerful personage or pretentious official

Hydromancy:  divination by the appearance or motion of liquids (as water)

Vanward:  located in the vanguard

Favonian:  of or relating to the west wind

Realia:  objects or activities used to relate classroom teaching to the real life especially of peoples studied

Comestible:  edible

3 responses to Edifying Ourselves: Word-a-Day

  1. 

    Pedantry, eh? That’s a pretty fancy word there, Ivy Leaguer. (So is pomposity, by the way.)

  2. 
    Ivy Leaguer without pomposity 4 April 2007 at 9:21 am

    This is the kind of crap that distances academics from the intelligent laymen. What a waste of time. Word of the day…get the f*** out of here with that BS. I stopped doing that during my 20s, when I realized I could do better things than nurture offputting pedantry.

  3. 

    I hope the favonian breezes blowing you toward your occidental opportunity proves an adventitious feather in your zibeline cap at Richmond, and does not leave you with a corvee to a panjandrum.

    Or, best wishes.