Word-Wednesday for March 6, 2019

And here is the Wannaskan Almanac for Word-Wednesday, March 6, 2019, the 10th Wednesday and the 65th day of the year, with 300 days remaining until the end of the year, 26 days remaining until April Fools Day, and 1,084 days until Twosday, February 22, 2022.

Since March 1 was meteorological spring this year, today is the first Wednesday over the winter hump.

Nordhem Lunch: Meatball Dinner


Earth/Moon Almanac for March 6, 2019
Sunrise: 6:56am; Sunset: 6:14pm; 3 minutes, 35 seconds more daylight today
Moonrise: 7:22am; Moonset: 6:17pm, new moon


Temperature Almanac for March 6, 2019
           Average      Record       Today
High       28              61             10
Low         8             -36           -11


March 6 Celebrations from National Day Calendar

• National Proofreading Day
• National Dentist’s Day
• National Dress Day
• National Frozen Food Day
• National White Chocolate Cheesecake Day
• National Oreo Cookie Day
• Ash Wednesday

March 6 Riddle
Often we are covered with wisdom and wit, 

and oft with a cloth where the dinner guests sit.
In beauty around you and over your head, 

we are countless, though numbered when bound to be read.*

March 6 Pun
Can February March? No, but April May.


March 6 Punctuation Point
A writer can use an emdash--the longest of the three dashes--for many of the same purposes as one might use a comma, such as when pair of emdashes might be used if the sentence already contains commas. Similarly, a writer might emphasize information with an emdash.  Examples include:

• WannaskaWriter disliked walking to Chairman Joe's for Guinness in March--the snow was too deep--but he had no choice, his Subaru was out of gas.
• For his birthday, John received a sweater, a jacket, a card--and 25 apples!
• Pizza, chocolate, and ice cream--these are some of W.A.K.W.I.R.'s favorite foods.

March 6 Notable Historic Events, Literary or Otherwise, from On This Day

• 1831 Edgar Allan Poe removed from West Point military academy; no one ever puts him back.
• 1836 Battle of the Alamo.
• 1853 Giuseppe Verdi's Opera La Traviata premieres in Venice.
• 1855 Gustave Flaubert writes goodbye to Louise Colet.
• 1981 Walter Cronkite signs off as anchorman of CBS Evening News.

March 6 Author/Artist Birthdays, from On This Day

• 1475 Michelangelo.
• 1619 Cyrano de Bergerac.
• 1806 Elizabeth Barrett Browning.
• 1906 Lou Costello.
• 1927 Gabriel García Márquez.
• 1937 Valentina Tereshkova, Soviet cosmonaut and first woman in space.

Words-I-Looked-Up-This-Week Writer's Challenge
Make a single sentence (or poem) from the following words:

• alembic: a distilling apparatus, now obsolete, consisting of a rounded, necked flask and a cap with a long beak for condensing and conveying the products to a receiver.
• catpurse: a pickpocket or thief.
• cwtch: to lie down.
• direption: he art of plundering.
• ephemeris: a table or data file giving the calculated positions of a celestial object at regular intervals throughout a period.
• mummer: an actor in a traditional masked mime.
• strawhat: of, relating to, or being summer theater.
• topiary: the art or practice of clipping shrubs or trees into ornamental shapes.
• tzolkin: a period of 260 days constituting a complete cycle of all the permutations of 20 day names with the numbers 1 to 13 that constitutes the Maya sacred year — compare tun.
• winkle: extract or obtain something with difficulty.

March 6 Word-Wednesday Feature
Like some people, some words have multiple personalities. 

Take the homograph: each of two or more words spelled the same but having different meanings and origins. These multiple personality words naturally go by several synonyms:
auto-antonym or autantonym or contronym or contranym or Janus word.

Homonyms are words with multiple meanings (senses), where one is the reverse of another. The word apparent can mean obvious, but it can also mean something believed to be true based on an observation that later proved to be untrue based on evidence. Here's a list of more homonyms.

Awful
May be a really bad Wannaskan Almanac post; may be a post worthy of awe.

Bill
May be an amount of money owed for goods supplied or services rendered, set out in a printed or written statement of charges submitted to a customer showing how much is owed; may be the legal tender one uses to pay for goods or services.

Bolt
May be a device to secure your door to keep yourself safe from harm; may be run away in the other direction.

Buckle
May be what you do to fasten an item; may be bending and collapsing under weight or pressure.

Cleave
May be splitting or cutting in two; may be adhering or clinging to something else.

Clip
May be done by scissors to a piece of paper; may be using a paperclip fasten them back together.

Consult
May be getting assistance from an almanac or other authority; may be providing for pay on a subject for which you are an expert.

Dust
May be a random collection of fine particulate matter; may be removing such particulate matter; may be sprinkling something with fine particulate matter.

Fast
May be, as in a busy tavern, a patron has to be fast to get in his Guinness order; may be that the bartender has to hold fast with the beverage until the patron makes payment.

Fight with
May be someone with whom you are having a disagreement; may be someone who is your ally; may be your weapon of choice.

Garnish
May be adding enhancements to your pizza; may be taking away what you possess.

Help
May be providing assistance; may be you can’t help doing something, where you’re incapable of stopping either yourself or the outcome.

Left
May be remaining behind; may be going away.

Oversight
May be supervising or managing; may be failing to see what you should have been looking for.

Sanction
May be imposing a penalty; may be giving formal approval.

Screen
May be showing something; may be hiding something from view.

Toss out
May be giving up on a potential solution or idea; may be submitting an idea for consideration.

Quantum
May be a subatomic particle representing the smallest amount known energy in existence; may be a large leap forward.

Variety
May be in reference to one type of something (Granny Smith as a variety); may be in reference to  multiple types (a variety of apples, Granny Smith and Golden Delicious and Honey Crisp).


March 6 Squibs

• Loud art gets momentary attention; quiet art establishes concentration.

• Poetry - that thing for which we have no better word.

• In writing as in living, look for what you may have otherwise missed.

• Art jumbles priorities - truth, fact, personality, faith - in a good way.

• The future is always dark; that is its consolation.

• Rewriting the first draft is an act of hope, so is sending in the final draft.

Be better than yesterday, learn a new word today, try to stay out of trouble - at least until tomorrow, and write when you have the time.

*leaves