Word-Wednesday for September 28, 2022

And here is the Wannaskan Almanac with Word-Wednesday for September 28, 2022, the thirty-ninth Wednesday of the year, the first Wednesday of fall, and the 271st day of the year, with 94 days remaining. Brought to you again by Bead Gypsy Studio, featuring a 20% off sale for all necklaces with chains, in stock or new orders, for the entire month of September.


Wannaska Phenology Update for September 28, 2022
First Frost

Pretty much right on schedule, we had our first frost on Monday, September 26. According to the Plantmaps interactive Web site, we live in Zone 4, where first frosts happen on average between September 1 and September 10. And yes, Sven, the site lists Wannaska, but not Pencer.

September 28 Fickle Pickle Wednesday Menu Special: Potato Dumpling


September 28 Nordhem Wednesday Lunch: Updated daily by 11:00am, usually.



Earth/Moon Almanac for September 28, 2022
Sunrise: 7:19am; Sunset: 7:10pm; 3 minutes, 33 seconds less daylight today
Moonrise: 10:29am; Moonset: 8:21pm, waxing crescent, 9% illuminated.


Temperature Almanac for September 28, 2022
                Average            Record              Today
High            60                     80                     63
Low             38                      19                      47


September 28 Celebrations from National Day Calendar

• World Dense Breast Day
• National Drink Beer Day
• National Good Neighbor Day
• National North Carolina Day
• National Strawberry Cream Pie Day
• National Women’s Health & Fitness Day
• Freedom from Hunger Day
• International Day for Universal Access to Information
• World Rabies Day
• Czech Statehood Day
• Feast Day of St. Conval

September 28 Word Riddle
What’s the difference between a shuffled deck of cards, a dressmaker without glitter, and a baseball pitcher?*


September 28 Word Pun
Prison is just one word to you, but for some people, it’s a whole sentence.


September 28 Walking into a Bar Grammar
A pleonasm walked step by step into a bar.


September 28 Etymology Word of the Week
resilience
 /rə-ˈzil-yəns/ n., the capacity to recover quickly from difficulties — toughness; the ability of a substance or object to spring back into shape — elasticity, from 1620s, "act of rebounding or springing back," often of immaterial things, from Latin resiliens, present participle of resilire "to rebound, recoil," from re- "back" (see re-) + salire "to jump, leap" (see salient (adj.)). Compare result (v.). In physical sciences, the meaning "elasticity, power of returning to original shape after compression, etc." is by 1824.


September 28 Notable Historic Events, Literary or Otherwise, from On This Day

• 1701 Divorce legalized in Maryland.
• 1829 Walker's Appeal, racial antislavery pamphlet, published in Boston.
• 1995 Batman Forever released in Czech Republic.

September 28 Author/Artist/Character Birthdays, from On This Day

• 551 BC Confucius.
• 1493 Agnolo Firenzuola, Italian poet.
• 1796 David Walker, African-American abolitionist.
• 1836 Thomas Crapper, English plumber and inventor of the ballcock.
• 1840 Rudolf Baumbach, German writer of student drinking songs.
• 1851 Henry Arthur Jones, English playwright.
• 1856 Kate Douglas Wiggin, American author of Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm.   
• 1892 Elmer Rice, American playwright and novelist.
• 1909 Al Capp [Alfred Gerald Caplin], Li'l Abner cartoonist.
• 1909 Stephen Spender, poet.
• 1914 Maria Franziska von Trapp, Austrian-born American singer.
• 1917 Václav Kašlík, Czech opera composer.
• 1932 Michael G[reatrex] Coney, Canadian science-fiction author.
• 1950 Brian Keenan, Irish author.

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

• acrasia: /uh-KRAY-zee-yuh/ n., the state of mind in which someone acts against their better judgment through weakness of will; lack of self-control.
• banausic: /bə-ˈnô-zik/ adj., not operating on a refined or elevated level; mundane.
• craquelure: /ˈkra-kə-lo͝oər/ n., a network of fine cracks in the paint or varnish of a painting.
• dissilient: /də̇-ˈsil-yənt/ adj., bursting apart; bursting open.
• lees: /lēz/ n., the sediment of wine in the barrel.
• manavelins: /mə-ˈnav-ə-lə̇nz/ pl. n., odds and ends of food, leftovers; miscellaneous scraps or small items.
• novalunosis: /nova-loon-'oh-sis/ (n.) – the state of relaxation and wonderment experienced while gazing upon the stars.
• prothalamion: /ˌprō-THə-ˈlā-mē-ən/ n., a song or poem written to celebrate an upcoming wedding.
• sharenting: /ˈʃɛ-rən-tɪŋ/ n., the action of sharing the responsibilities of being a child’s parent or caregiver; the action or practice of sharing news, images, or videos of one’s children on social media websites.
• vatic: /ˈvad-ik/ adj., describing or predicting what will happen in the future.

September 28, 2022 Word-Wednesday Feature
Mystery Guest
Today, Word-Wednesday presents a Mystery Guest, whose name almost any English-speaking reader would recognize, and who died on this day in 1891. Now considered one of America's greatest novelists, our Mystery Guest was regarded as a minor American writer at death. Born in 1819 as the third of eight children in a New York in a family of Scottish and Dutch descent, our Mystery Guest's father was a prosperous merchant whose death in 1832 left the family in dire financial straits after living a privileged, opulent life in a household with three or more servants at a time.

Best known for Typee: A Peep at Polynesian Life, an 1846 account of our Mystery Guest's experiences in the South Pacific, the book was successful enough to warrant an 1847 sequel: Omoo: A Narrative Adventure of Life in the South Seas. These two books — the most successful of the Mystery Guest's writing career — were followed by more than a dozen later works, none of which achieved commercial success or critical acclaim. At death, all of our Mystery Guest’s books were out of print, and our Mystery Guest was flirting with obscurity. Though briefly mentioned in The New York Times obituary colomn, the paper misspelled the title of the novel now indelibly associated with this our Mystery Guest’s name.

Twenty-six years later in 1917, critic Carl Van Doren wrote an article praising this week's Mystery Guest. That article, combined with a 1919 centenary celebration, revived interest in the author. In 1923, D. H. Lawrence praised the Mystery Guest's work, especially an 1851 seafaring adventure that is now regarded as one of America's greatest novels, and which parenthetically, begins with an opening line that now enjoys classic status. In 2014, English critic Robert McCrum hailed the 1851 book as "the supreme American novel," ranking it number 17 on his list of history's one hundred greatest novels. About it, McCrum wrote: "It is a literary performance that is exhilarating, extraordinary, sometimes exasperating and, towards its apocalyptic climax, unputdownable."

This Week's Mystery Guest made many memorable observations on countless topics, including this one from his 1850 novel White-Jacket:

"The worst of our evils we blindly inflict upon ourselves."

Who is this Mystery Guest? 

What is the famous novel's opening line? 

How was the title misspelled by The New York Times in 1891? 

What is the title of the famous 1851 novel? 

Answers appear in the anagrams below.
Lev Mahler Milne.
Alice ham smell.
Beck idiom.
My kid Cob.

From A Year with Rilke, September 28 Entry
In Rome, from Letters to a Young Poet

There is much beauty here, for great beauty is everywhere. Living waters flow endlessly through ancient aqueducts into the great city, and dance in many piazzas over white stone basins and spread out in spacious pools, murmuring by day and lifting their murmur into the starry, wind-softened night. There are gardens here, unforgettable boulevards, and stairs—stairs designed by Michelangelo, stairs inspired by downward flowing water—step flowing into widening step like wave into wave. From such impressions you gather yourself, you win yourself back from the clamoring multiplicity, and slowly learn to know a very few things in which the eternal is reflected, which you love and in which your solitude allows you to take part.

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 cards are out of sequence; the dressmaker is out of sequins; the baseball pitcher is out to seek wins.