Word-Wednesday for December 1, 2021

And here is the Wannaskan Almanac for Word-Wednesday, December 1, 2021, the 48th Wednesday of the year, the eleventh Wednesday of fall, and the 335th day of the year, with 30 days remaining.


Wannaska Nature Update for December 1, 2021
Snow Cover Makes for Slim Pickings

 

Don't forget to feed me!

Nordhem Lunch: Specials: 

Hamburger Gravy Dinner

Hot Hamburger Sandwich with Mashed Potatoes and Dressing

Corn Chowder Soup with Ham Sandwich or Hamburger


Earth/Moon Almanac for December 1, 2021
Sunrise: 7:56am; Sunset: 4:30pm; 1 minutes, 45 seconds less daylight today
Moonrise: 4:12am; Moonset: 3:02pm, waning crescent, 10% illuminated.

Temperature Almanac for December 1, 2021
                Average            Record              Today
High             24                     50                     42
Low                9                    -32                     25


December 1 Celebrations from National Day Calendar

• National Pie Day
• National Eat a Red Apple Day
• Bifocals at the Monitor Liberation Day
• Day With(out) Art Day
• Rosa Parks Day
• National Package Protection Day

December 1 Word Riddle
What did Sven learn when he dated Edith and Kate at the same time?*


December 1 Word Pun
For word-lovers, Pfizer just developed a new product combining alphabet soup and ex-lax, called Letter Rip!


December 1 Etymology Word of the Week

it: /it/ Old English hit, neuter nominative and accusative of third person singular pronoun, from Proto-Germanic demonstrative base khi- (source also of Old Frisian hit, Dutch het, Gothic hita "it"), from Proto-Indo-European ko- "this" (see he). Used in place of any neuter noun, hence, as gender faded in Middle English, it took on the meaning "thing or animal spoken about before."

The h- was lost due to being in an unemphasized position, as in modern speech the h- in "give it to him," "ask her," is heard only "in the careful speech of the partially educated" [Weekley]. It "the sex act" is from 1610s; meaning "sex appeal (especially in a woman)" first attested 1904 in works of Rudyard Kipling, popularized 1927 as title of a book by Elinor Glyn, and by application of It Girl to silent-film star Clara Bow (1905-1965). In children's games, the meaning "the one who must tag or catch the others" is attested from 1842.

From Old English as nominative of an impersonal verb or statement when the thing for which it stands is implied (it rains, it pleases me). After an intransitive verb, used transitively for the action denoted, from 1540s (originally in fight it out). That's it "there is no more" is from 1966; this is it "the anticipated or dreaded moment has arrived" is from 1942.

December 1 Notable Historic Events, Literary or Otherwise, from On This Day

• 1750 First school in America to offer manual training courses opens in Maryland.
• 1822 Franz Liszt, aged 11, debuts as a pianist in Vienna.
• 1831 Erie Canal closes for entire month due to cold weather, but the River Thames does not freeze this year.
• 1884 Society of Independent Artists hold first exhibition in Polychrome Pavilion, Paris.
• 1887 Sherlock Holmes first appears in print in Study in Scarlet by Arthur Conan Doyle.
• 1919 AA Milne's Mr Pim Passes By premieres in Manchester.
• 1919 Lady Nancy Astor sworn-in as first female member of British Parliament.
• 1924 George and Ira Gershwin's musical Lady Be Good premieres.
• 1929 Game of Bingo invented by Edwin S Lowe.
• 1955 Rosa Parks is arrested for refusing to move to the back of a bus and give her seat to a white passenger in Montgomery, Alabama.

December 1 Author/Artist/Character Birthdays, from On This Day

• 1525 Tadeáš Hájek, Czech physician and astronomer.
• 1671 Francesco Stradivari, Italian violin maker.
• 1716 Etienne-Maurice Falconet, French sculptor.
• 1724 Dismas Hatas, Czech composer.
• 1766 Nikolai Mikhailovich Karamzin, Russian writer.
• 1847 Agathe Backer Grøndahl, Norwegian pianist, composer, and teacher.
• 1886 Rex Stout, American mystery writer of Nero Wolf novels.
• 1935 Woody Allen [Allen Konigsberg].
• 1940 Richard Pryor.
• 1946 Gilbert O'Sullivan, Irish singer.

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

• arrogate: /ˈer-ə-ɡāt/ v., take or claim (something) without justification.
• bluestocking: /ˈblo͞oˌ-stäk-iNG/ n., an intellectual or literary woman.
• cacky: /ˈkæ-kɪ/ adj., of or like excrement; dirty, worthless, or contemptible.
• demonifuge: /dih-MON-ih-fyooj/ n., a substance or medicine used to exorcize demons; anything thought to give protection against evil spirits; a charm or protection against demons; from classical Latin “daemōn” (demon) + connective “-i-” + suffix “-fuge”.
• esemplastic: /ˌe-sem-ˈplas-tik/ adj., molding into one; unifying.
• fulgent: /ˈfəl-jənt/ adj., shining brightly.
• gadarene: /ˈɡad-ə-ˌrēn/ adj., involving or engaged in a headlong or potentially disastrous rush to do something.
• hegumene: /hɪ-ˈɡju-mi-nē/ n., the head of a nunnery.
• omicron: /'ōm-ə-krän/ n., the fifteenth letter of the Greek alphabet (Ο, ο), transliterated as ‘o.’; the fifteenth star in a constellation.
• peccant: /ˈpek-ənt/ adj., having committed a fault or sin; offending; diseased or causing disease.

December 1, 2021 Word-Wednesday Feature
it: /it/ pronoun, used to refer to a thing previously mentioned or easily identified - "a room with two beds in it"; referring to an animal or child of unspecified sex - "she was holding the baby, cradling it and smiling into its face"; referring to a fact or situation previously mentioned, known, or happening.

No word is too small for Word-Wednesday, and it is one of the biggest small words in the English language. One can easily understand how a child learns to master certain words first: why, no, come, go, tummy, toe. But the ease with which a child learns to master all the complexities of the word it is baffling.

It is hot. 

It is bad. 

It is December. 

It is mine. 

It is sunny. 

It is Wannaska. 

It is nighttime. 

It is still fall. 

It is bedtime. 

It is me. 

It is impossible.  

It is not safe. 

It hurts. 

Tag - you’re it!

There are over one hundred pronouns in the English language, classified as personal, object, possessive, reflexive, intensive, indefinite, demonstrative, interrogative, and relative, where it falls into both the personal and object categories, and where it can refer to both a discrete, discontinuous person, object, or moment, and to a conjoined, continuous group or time period.

In The Master and His Emissary, Iain McGilchrist notes how language shapes our experience of the world: “Language makes the uncommon common. It can never create experience of something we do not know - only release something in us that is already there.” The exceptional feature of a young child’s experience - and therefore, the child's language - is that each experience, each word, is an authentic, bodily experience. Young children do not yet have experiences of mind, only of their bodies in sensual world. This helps them fluidly move back and forth between experiences of the instantaneous moment and continuous flow without having to dwell on thinking or concepts. It is the perfect word for the young child's brain to organize the world.

"And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good."

Genesis 1:31

From A Year with Rilke, December 1 Entry                                                                                                  

Let This Darkness Be a Bell Tower, from Sonnets to Orpheus, II, 29
 

Quiet friend who has come so far,
feel how your breathing makes more space around you.
Let this darkness be a bell tower
and you the bell. As you ring,

what batters you becomes your strength.
Move back and forth into the change.
What is it like, such intensity of pain?
If the drink is bitter, turn yourself to wine.

In this uncontainable night,
be the mystery at the crossroads of your senses,
the meaning discovered there.

And if the world has ceased to hear you,
say to the silent earth: I flow.
To the rushing water, speak: I am.




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.


*Sven learned he couldn’t have his Kate and Edith, too.