Word-Wednesday for March 6, 2024

And here is the Wannaskan Almanac with Word-Wednesday for March 6, 2024, the tenth Wednesday of the year, the eleventh Wednesday of winter, and the sixty-sixth day of the year, with three-hundred days remaining.

 
Wannaska Phenology Update for March 6, 2024
According to meteorologists, spring in the Wannaska begins each year on March 1. Astronomers say that spring begins on the vernal equinox, this leap year, on March 19 at 22:06 Central Time. A month of paradox, March if often the peak of the snow season but it’s also our first month of real spring — the awakening season. March is a good time to prune grape vines, apple trees, and oak trees. Black bear cubs are now about a month old, weigh less than three pounds each, and are in dens with their still-sleeping mama bears.

March 6 Fickle Pickle Wednesday Menu Special: Potato Dumpling


March 6 Nordhem Wednesday Lunch: Updated daily, occasionally.


Earth/Moon Almanac for March 6, 2024
Sunrise: 6:55am; Sunset: 6:15pm; 3 minutes, 35 seconds more daylight today
Moonrise: 5:26am; Moonset: 1:06pm, waxing crescent, 20% illuminated.


Temperature Almanac for March 6, 2024
                Average            Record              Today
High             28                     60                     35
Low                5                    -37                      11

Dear March—Come in—(1320)
by Emily Dickinson

Dear March—Come in—
How glad I am—
I hoped for you before—
Put down your Hat—
You must have walked—
How out of Breath you are—
Dear March, how are you, and the Rest—
Did you leave Nature well—
Oh March, Come right upstairs with me—
I have so much to tell—

I got your Letter, and the Birds—
The Maples never knew that you were coming—
I declare - how Red their Faces grew—
But March, forgive me—
And all those Hills you left for me to Hue—
There was no Purple suitable—
You took it all with you—

Who knocks? That April—
Lock the Door—
I will not be pursued—
He stayed away a Year to call
When I am occupied—
But trifles look so trivial
As soon as you have come

That blame is just as dear as Praise
And Praise as mere as Blame—

March 6 Celebrations from National Day Calendar

• National Dress Day
• National Oreo Cookie Day
• National White Chocolate Cheesecake Day
• National Frozen Food Day
• National Dentist’s Day
• Feast Day of Fridolin of Säckingen

March 6 Word Pun
Sven accidentally swallowed some Scrabble tiles. Now he’s experiencing constant vowel movements. Monique says his next trip to the bathroom could spell disaster.


March 6 Word Riddle
Where do dads store their dad jokes?*


March 6 The Devil’s Dictionary Word-Pram
SACRED, adj. Dedicated to some religious purpose; having a divine character; inspiring solemn thoughts or emotions; as, the Dalai Lama of Thibet; the Moogum of M'bwango; the temple of Apes in Ceylon; the Cow in India; the Crocodile, the Cat and the Onion of ancient Egypt; the Mufti of Moosh; the hair of the dog that bit Noah, etc.

    All things are either sacred or profane.
    The former to ecclesiasts bring gain;
    The latter to the devil appertain.
    —Dumbo Omohundro


March 6 Etymology Word of the Week
conceit
/kənˈsēt/ n., excessive pride in oneself; a fanciful expression in writing or speech; an elaborate metaphor, from late 14th century, "a thought, a notion, that which is mentally conceived," from conceiven (see conceive) based on analogy of deceit/deceive and receipt/receive. The sense evolved from "something formed in the mind" to "fanciful or witty notion, ingenious thought" (1510s), to "vanity, exaggerated estimate of one's own mental abilities" (circa 1600) through shortening of self-conceit (1580s).

A doublet of concept, it sometimes was spelled conceipt in Middle English. Sometimes the Italian form concetto (plural concetti) was used in English 18th-19th century for "piece of affected wit;" OED describes it as "a term originally proper to Italian literature."


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

• 1831 Edgar Allan Poe court-martialed and dismissed from West Point military academy for gross neglect of duty and disobedience of orders.
• 1831 Vincenzo Bellini's opera La Sonnambula premieres.
• 1835 Volume One of Thomas Carlyle's famous work, The French Revolution: A History, is accidentally burnt by a maid using it as fire starter before its publication. Carlyle re-writes it.
• 1836 Battle of the Alamo, remembered.
• 1851 Dion Boucicault's play Love in a Maze premieres.
• 1853 Giuseppe Verdi's opera La Traviata premieres.
• 1855 Gustave Flaubert writes goodbye to the poet Louise Colet.
• 1857 Dred Scott Decision: US Supreme Court rules Africans cannot be US citizens.
• 1869 Dmitri Mendeleev presents the first periodic table of the elements to the Russian Chemical Society.
• 1886 First US nurses' magazine, The Nightingale, published.
• 1906 Nora Blatch is first woman elected to American Society of Civil Engineers.
• 1933 Maxwell Anderson's stage drama Both Your Houses opens, and later wins a Pulitzer Prize.
• 1950 Silly Putty goes on sale in the US.
• 1955 Dutch premiere of Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot.
• 1967 Joseph Stalin's daughter Svetlana Allilujeva approaches the US Embassy in New Delhi, India, and asks for political asylum.
• 1973 Asylum Records releases Closing Time, the debut album by singer-songwriter Tom Waits.
• 1980 French Academy, founded in 1635, elects it first woman novelist: Marguerite Youcenar.

March 6 Author/Artist/Character Birthdays, from On This Day

• 1475 Michelangelo, Italian sculptor, painter, architect and poet of the High Renaissance.
• 1495 Luigi Alamanni, Italian poet.
• 1616 Malachias Siebenhaar, Czech composer.
• 1619 Cyrano de Bergerac, French playwright and novelist.
• 1763 Jean Xavier Lefevre, French composer.
• 1785 Karol Kurpiński, Polish composer.
• 1806 Elizabeth Barrett Browning, English poet.
• 1834 George du Maurier, Franco-British illustrator and writer.
• 1871 Ben Harney, American composer and "Father of Ragtime Piano".
• 1885 Ring Lardner, American sports writer.
• 1887 Henri Gagnon, Canadian organist.
• 1888 Kathleen Quigly, Irish stained glass artist, illustrator, and painter
• 1906 Lou Costello, American comedian.
• 1909 Stanisław Jerzy Lec, Polish poet and author.
• 1917 Will Eisner, American illustrator and cartoonist.
• 1923 Erhard Karkoschka, Czech composer.
• 1924 Sarah Caldwell, American conductor.
• 1926 Miroslav Klega, Czech composer.
• 1927 Gabriel García Márquez, Columbian novelist, 1982 Nobel Prize in Literature.
• 1937 Valentina Tereshkova, first woman in space.
• 1947 Teru Miyamoto, Japanese author.
• 1953 Jan Kjærstad, Norwegian author.
• 1963 Kathy Kelly, Irish musician.

Words-I-Looked-Up-This-Week Writer's Challenge
Write a story or pram from the following words:

• chillax: /ˌCHi-laks/ v., to calm down and relax.
• colback: /KOHL-back/ n., busby; a fur headpiece of Turkish origin.
• esplanade: /e-splə-näd/ n., a long, open, level area, typically beside the sea, along which people may walk for pleasure; an open, level space separating a fortress from a town.
• goliard: /ˈgōl-yərd/ n., a wandering student of the 12th or 13th century given to the writing of satiric Latin verse and to convivial living and minstrelsy.
• hippogriff: /ˈhip-ə-ɡrif/ n., a mythical creature with the body of a horse and the wings and head of an eagle, born of the union of a male griffin and a filly.
• jeggings: /ˈje-ɡiNGz/ n., tight-fitting stretch pants for women, styled to resemble a pair of denim jeans.
• mestorazvitie/месторазвитие: /meh-sta-RA-zvee-tye/ n., Russian, topogenesis; place-development in the sense that geographical environment shapes culture.
• otiosity: / oh-dee-AH-suh-dee/ n., the condition or state of being unoccupied or inactive; ease; idleness, laziness; redundancy, ineffectuality.
• resipiscence: /rehs-ih-PIHS-ints/ n., the recognition of an error accompanied by a desire to do a better job next time.
• voguing: /VOH-ging/ n., a style of dance performed to popular (usually house) music and designed to imitate and exaggerate the characteristic postures of a fashion model on a catwalk; a form of club entertainment based on this.

March 6, 2024 Word-Wednesday Feature
Finders Keepers
Some words are hauntingly beautiful, and Word-Wednesday want to bring them to you even when they belong to other languages. This week we do so courtesy of Ella Frances Sanders' book,  Lost in Translation: An Illustrated Compendium of Untranslatable Words from Around the World. Check out this book for the gorgeous, playful illustrations that accompany each word. With spring just around the corner, our hearts begin to open up before the snow melts. Here are a few words from her book to sprinkle into your conversations the next time you fika:

• commuovere: / koh-MWOH-eh-reh/ v., ITALIAN, often taken to mean "heartwarming", but directly relates to a story that moved you to tears.
• fika: /FEE-ka/ v., SWEDISH, gathering together to talk and take a break from everyday routines, usually drinking coffee and eating pastries - either at a café or at home (or at The Bead Gypsy) - often for hours on end.
• forelsket: /FOR-ell-sket/ n., NORWEGIAN, the indescribable euphoria experiences as you begin to fall in love.
• gurfa: /GOOR-fa/ n., ARABIC, the amount of water that can be held in one hand.
• jugaad: /JOO-gahd/ n., HINDI, ensuring that things happen even with minimal resources, even if they happen "by hook or by crook".
• kilig: /KEE-lig/ n., TAGALOG, the feeling of butterflies in your stomach, usually when something romantic or cute takes place.
• komorebi: /koh-moh-REH-bee/ n., JAPANESE, the sunlight that filters through the leaves of the trees.
• luftmensche: /LOOFT-mensh/ n., YIDDISH, refers to someone who is a bit of a dreamer and literally means "air person".
• pålegg: /POH-lehg/ n., NORWEGIAN, anything and everything you can put on a slice of bread.
• saudade: /SOW-dahd/ n., PORTUGUESE, a vague, constant desire for something that does not and probably cannot exist, a nostalgia longing for someone or something loved and then lost.
• trepverter: /TREPP-vert-er/ n., YIDDISH, a witty riposte or comeback you think of only when it is too late to use. Literally, "staircase words".
• tretår: /TREY-tawr/ n., SWEDISH, on it's own, "tår" means a coup of coffee and "palår" is the refill of said coffee. A "tretår" is therefore a second refill, or a "threefill".
• tsundoku: /soon-DOH-koo/ n., JAPANESE, leaving a book unread after buying it, typically piled up together with other unread books.
• wabi-sabi: /WAH-bee SAH-bee/ n., JAPANESE, finding beauty in the imperfections, an acceptance of the cycle of life and death.

From A Year with Rilke, March 6 Entry
Where I Am Going, from Book of Images

Again the murmur of my own deep life grows stronger,
flowing along wider shores.
Things grow ever more related to me,
and I see farther into their forms.
I become more trustful of the nameless.
My mind, like a bird,
rises from the oak tree into the wind,
and my heart sinks through the pond's reflected day
to where the fishes move.

Still Life with Apples, Grapes, Pears and LeavesStill Life with Apples, Grapes, Pears and Leaves
by Vincent van Gogh

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.




*In a dad-a-base.