Word-Wednesday for December 2, 2020

And here is the Wannaskan Almanac for Word-Wednesday, December 2, 2020, the 49th Wednesday of the year, the eleventh Wednesday of fall, and the 337th day of the year, with 29 days remaining.


Wannaska Nature Update for December 2, 2020
Ever inventive, the Red Squirrel finds new way to irritate humans.

Nordhem Lunch: Closed.


Earth/Moon Almanac for December 2, 2020
Sunrise: 7:58am; Sunset: 4:29pm; 1 minutes, 39 seconds less daylight today
Moonrise: 6:14pm; Moonset: 10:10am, waning gibbous


Temperature Almanac for December 2, 2020
                Average            Record              Today
High             24                     53                     32
Low                8                    -32                    19


December 2 Celebrations from National Day Calendar

• National Fritters Day
• National Mutt Day
• Special Education Day

December 2 Word Riddle
What is the only known predator of the swordfish?*


December 2 Pun
There were four types of poison in ancient Rome. 

Poisons I, II, and III would kill with varying degrees of pain. 

Poison IV would cause terrible itchiness.


December 2 Roseau Times-Region Headline:
Roseau School Yearbook Archivist Deals With Her Past Issues


December 2 Notable Historic Events, Literary or Otherwise, from On This Day

• 1409 The University of Leipzig opens.
• 1620 English language newspaper Namloos begins publishing in Amsterdam.
• 1867 In a New York City theater, British author Charles Dickens gives his first public reading in the United States.
• 1883 Johannes Brahms' 3rd Symphony in F premieres with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra.
• 1933 Fred Astaire's 1st film, Dancing Lady, released.
• 1950 I Robot collection of science fiction short stories by Isaac Asimov published.

December 2 Author/Artist/Character Birthdays, from On This Day

• 1859 Georges Seurat.
• 1902 Miroslav Ponc, Czech composer.
• 1948 T. C. Boyle.
• 1963 Ann Patchett.

December 2 Word Fact
The shortest -ology is  oology, the scientific study of eggs.


December 2, 2020 Song of Myself, Verse 5 of 52

5
I believe in you my soul, the other I am must not abase itself to you,
And you must not be abased to the other.

Loafe with me on the grass, loose the stop from your throat,
Not words, not music or rhyme I want, not custom or lecture, not even the best,
Only the lull I like, the hum of your valvèd voice.

I mind how once we lay such a transparent summer morning,
How you settled your head athwart my hips and gently turn’d over upon me,
And parted the shirt from my bosom-bone, and plunged your tongue to my bare-stript heart,
And reach’d till you felt my beard, and reach’d till you held my feet.

Swiftly arose and spread around me the peace and knowledge that pass all the argument of the earth,
And I know that the hand of God is the promise of my own,
And I know that the spirit of God is the brother of my own,
And that all the men ever born are also my brothers, and the women my sisters and lovers,
And that a kelson of the creation is love,
And limitless are leaves stiff or drooping in the fields,
And brown ants in the little wells beneath them,
And mossy scabs of the worm fence, heap’d stones, elder, mullein and poke-weed.


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

• ambilogy: uncertain or doubtful meaning in a person’s speech or writing; ambiguity.
• commentariat: members of the news media considered as a class.
• drintling: the clucking or gobbling sound that turkeys make.
• egotesticle: excessively conceited or absorbed in one’s manliness; man-centered.
• fulgurous: amazingly impressive; characteristic of or resembling lightening.
• gardyloo: used by residents in medieval Scotland to warn passers-by that chamber pot waste was about to be thrown from a window into the street below.
• kelson: a longitudinal structure running above and fastened to the keel of a ship in order to stiffen and strengthen its framework.
• opsimath: a person who begins to learn or study only late in life.
• pettifogger: an inferior legal practitioner who deals with petty cases or employs dubious practices.
• slummock: to kiss amorously, in a particularly wet and slobbery way.

December 2, 2020 Word-Wednesday Feature
Words of the Year
It’s December, and the major dictionaries of the English language have announced their words of the year.  There are few surprises:

Collins Dictionary: "lockdown"

Dictionary.com: "pandemic"

Merriam-Webster Dictionary: "pandemic"

As reported by Word-Wednesday, previous words of the year for the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) include "toxic", "youthquake", "climate emergency" and "post truth". Citing too many words to sum up the events of 2020, the OED has been unable to accommodate selection to a single word for the first time in its history, choosing:

• "acquittal"
• "Brexit"
• "bubbles"
• "coronavirus"
• "face masks"
• "impeachment"
• "lockdown"
• "mail-in"
• "pandemic"
• "QANON"
• "R number"
• "remote/remotely"
• "shelter-in-place"
• "unmute"

To reflect the remarkable degree to which political or scientific terms have penetrated everyday communications, the OED also cited terms of the year, such as:

• "Black Lives Matter/BLM"
• "community transmission"
• "conspiracy theory"
• "essential workers"
• "flatten the curve"
• "following the science"

The German language word of the year tradition has been published by Wort des Jahres since 1971. This year the German press observed some colorful words and phrases of the year, including "geisterspiele" - literally "ghost games" for sport stadiums filled with cardboard pictures of fans, and "Bleiben Sie Gesund" - the formal, polite way to wish someone good health.

Ever different,  Macquarie Dictionary, the dictionary of Australian English, chose "doomscrolling": the act of consuming an endless procession of negative online news, to the detriment of the scroller's mental wellness.

Please add your own personal word of the year as a comment to supplement this list.


From A Year with Rilke, December 2 

In Your Sight, from Book of Hours, I, 13

I want to unfold.
Let no place in me hold itself closed,
for where I am closed, I am false.
I want to stay clear in your sight.



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.

*the penfish, because it is mightier.