Word-Wednesday for April 24, 2024

And here is the Wannaskan Almanac with Word-Wednesday for April 24, 2024, the seventeenth Wednesday of the year, the sixth Wednesday of spring, the fourth and last Wednesday of April, and the one-hundred fifteenth day of the year, with two-hundred fifty-one days remaining.

 
Wannaska Phenology Update for April 24, 2024
Porcupines Are Out
Porcupines are classified in two families: Old World (Hystricidae) from Italy, Asia, and Africa, and New World (Erethizontidae) indigenous to North and South America. The word "porcupine" comes from the Latin porcus pig + spina spine, quill, via Italian (Italian "porcospino", thorn-pig)—Middle French—Middle English. A regional American name for the animal is "quill-pig". A baby porcupine is a porcupette. When born, a porcupette's quills are soft hair; they harden with keratin within a few days, forming the sharp quills of adults.

April 24, 2024 Hummingbird Migration Update

April 24 Fickle Pickle Wednesday Menu Special: Potato Dumpling


April 24 Nordhem Wednesday Lunch: Updated daily, occasionally.


Earth/Moon Almanac for April 24, 2024
Sunrise: 6:15am; Sunset: 8:29pm; 3 minutes, 19 seconds more daylight today
Moonrise: 9:47pm; Moonset: 6:16am, waning gibbous, 99% illuminated.


Temperature Almanac for April 24, 2024
                Average            Record              Today
High             52                     86                     63
Low              29                     14                      41

Whan that Aprill, with his shoures soote
The droghte of March hath perced to the roote
And bathed every veyne in swich licour,
Of which vertu engendred is the flour;
Whan Zephirus eek with his sweete breeth
Inspired hath in every holt and heeth
The tendre croppes, and the yonge sonne
Hath in the Ram his halfe cours yronne,
And smale foweles maken melodye,
That slepen al the nyght with open eye-
(So priketh hem Nature in hir corages);
Thanne longen folk to goon on pilgrimages
And palmeres for to seken straunge strondes
To ferne halwes, kowthein sondry londes;
And specially from every shires ende
Of Engelond, to Caunterbury they wende,
The hooly blisful martir for to seke
That hem hath holpen, whan that they were seeke.

                        The prologue of Canterbury Tales, by Geoffrey Chaucer


April 24 Celebrations from National Day Calendar

• National Administrative Professional Day
• National Bucket List Day
• Stop Food Waste Day
• National Pigs-In-A-Blanket Day
• National Hairball Awareness Day
• Feast Day of Diarmaid of Armagh

April 24 Word Pun
Sven wrote a theatrical performance about puns; it was a play on words.


April 24 Word Riddle
What does a clock to when it’s  hungry?*


April 24 The Devil’s Dictionary Word-Pram
PERSEVERANCE, n. A lowly virtue whereby mediocrity achieves an inglorious success.

    "Persevere, persevere!" cry the homilists all,
    Themselves, day and night, persevering to bawl.
    "Remember the fable of tortoise and hare—
    The one at the goal while the other is—where?"
    Why, back there in Dreamland, renewing his lease
    Of life, all his muscles preserving the peace,
    The goal and the rival forgotten alike,
    And the long fatigue of the needless hike.
    His spirit a-squat in the grass and the dew
    Of the dogless Land beyond the Stew,
    He sleeps, like a saint in a holy place,
    A winner of all that is good in a race.
                    —Sukker Uffro


April 24 Etymology Word of the Week
gypsy
/ˈjipsē/ n., a member of a group of people who travel from place to place, especially in Europe, and who originally came from northern India, or anyone who travels often and does not live in one place for long, from also gipsy, circa 1600, alteration of gypcian, a worn-down Middle English dialectal form of egypcien "Egyptian," from the supposed origin of the people. As an adjective, from 1620s. Compare British gippy (1889) a modern shortened colloquial form of Egyptian.

Cognate with Spanish Gitano and close in sense to Turkish and Arabic Kipti "gypsy," literally "Coptic;" but in Middle French they were Bohémien (see bohemian), and in Spanish also Flamenco "from Flanders." "The gipsies seem doomed to be associated with countries with which they have nothing to do" [Weekley]. Zingari, the Italian and German name, is of unknown origin. Romany is from the people's own language, a plural adjective form of rom "man." Gipsy was the preferred spelling in England. The name is also in extended use applied to "a person exhibiting any of the qualities attributed to Gipsies, as darkness of complexion, trickery in trade, arts of cajolery, and, especially as applied to a young woman, playful freedom or innocent roguishness of action or manner" [Century Dictionary]. As an adjective from 1620s with a sense "unconventional; outdoor."


April 24 Historic Events, Literary or Otherwise, from On This Day

• 1479 BC Thutmose III ascends to the throne of Egypt, although power effectively shifts to Hatshepsut.
• 1503 Michelangelo undertakes to carve 12 Apostles for the Cathedral of Florence, each four and a quarter braccia high (248.2cm), at the rate of at least one completed statue per year. He produced only one, of St. Matthew, and that remained unfinished.
• 1704 First continuously published newspaper in America - The Boston News-Letter, is published.
• 1833 Jacob Evert & George Dulty patent first soda fountain.
• 1964 Gene Roddenberry registers his Star Trek series with the Writers Guild of America.
• 1985 Pulitzer prize awarded to Carolyn Lizer for Yin.
• 1990 Brian Friel's stage drama Dancing at Lughnasa opens at the Abbey Theatre in Dublin, Ireland; later wins Olivier Award, Tony Award, and Drama Desk Award for Best Play.

April 24 Author/Artist/Character Birthdays, from On This Day

• 1718 Nathaniel Hone, Irish-born portrait and miniature painter.
• 1766 Robert Bailey Thomas, American journalist and founder of The Farmer's Almanac.
• 1796 Karl Leberecht Immermann, German writer.
• 1815 Anthony Trollope, English novelist and poet.
• 1845 Carl Spitteler, Swiss poet.
• 1851 Eduardo Acevedo Díaz, Uruguayan writer.
• 1875 Jenő Huszka, Hungarian composer.
• 1904 Willem De Kooning, Dutch artist.
• 1905 Robert Penn Warren, American poet and novelist.
• 1907 Václav Trojan, Czech composer.
• 1916 Stanley Kauffmann, American playwright.
• 1921 Laci Boldemann, Swedish composer.
• 924 Clement Freud, British writer.
• 1928 Gustav Krivinka, Czech composer.
• 1931 Bridget Riley, British painter.

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

• aposematic: /ˌap-ə-se-MAD-ik/ adj., (of coloration or markings) serving to warn or repel predators.
• butoh: /ˈbo͞oˌtō/ n., a style of Japanese modern dance featuring dancers covered in white body paint.
• caracole: /ˈker-ə-kōl/ n., a half turn to right or left executed by a mounted horse.
• eremocene: /er-'ə-mə-sēn/ n., the age of loneliness, coined by E.O. Wilson.
• gur cake: / GUR-kayk/ n., a traditional Irish cake consisting of two thin layers of pastry with a filling of mincemeat or dried, typically baked in a tray and then cut into slices or squares.
• hookum-snivey: /HOOK-uhm-snahy-vee/ n., a con, trickery, fakery, deceit, skulduggery; a pretender at illness or calamity so as to evoke compassion and charity; a contrivance for undoing the bolt of a door from the outside; a device to help with putting on boots; adj., deceitful, tricky, sly.
• montane: /män-ˈtān/ adj., of or inhabiting mountainous country.
• pancratic: /pan-KRAD-ik/ adj., marked by or giving mastery of all subjects or matters.
• snarkenfaugister: /SNÄRK-en-fou-gi-stər/ n., an artisan who lovingly hand-crafts all those small, unremarkable, but necessary, little artifacts that are required for the full enjoyment of a busy modern life.
• soigné: /swän-YĀ/ adj., dressed very elegantly; well groomed.

April 24, 2024 Word-Wednesday Feature
Birdwatching Words
Blessed by boreal forests and many bodies of breeding waters, Wannaska is a wonderful place for birdwatching. This week Word-Wednesday offers a primer of birdwatching terms.

booby
/ˈbü-bē/ n., any of several tropical seabirds (genus Sula) of the gannet family, where súla is the Old Norse and Icelandic word for the other member of the family Sulidae, the gannet. Common boobies include the Abbott's, the Blue-footed, the Brown, the Hazel, the Masked, the Peruvian, and the Red-footed.

cock
/käk/ n., a male bird, especially a rooster, from "male of the domestic fowl," from Old English cocc "male bird," Old French coc (12th century, Modern French coq), Old Norse kokkr, all of echoic origin. Compare Albanian kokosh "cock," Greek kikkos, Sanskrit kukkuta, Malay kukuk. "Though at home in English and French, not the general name either in Teutonic or Romanic; the latter has derivatives of L. gallus, the former of OTeut. hanon-" [OED]; compare hen. Common cocks include the Road Island Red, the Leghorn, and the Silkie.

hooter
/ˈho͞o-dər/ n., bird that hoots, from by 1823, "anything that hoots," especially an owl, agent noun from hoot (v.). Slang meaning "nose" is from 1958. Common hooters include the Barn, the Barred, the Eastern screech, the Great grey, the Great horned, the Little, the Long-eared, the Northern saw-whet, the Short-eared, the Snowy, and the Tawny.

pecker
/ˈpek-ər/ n., one that pecks. Common peckers include the American three-toed, the Black-backed, the Downy,,the Flickers, the Pileated, the Red-bellied, the Red-headed, and the Yellow-bellied.

tit
/tit/ n., a titmouse or small songbird that searches acrobatically for insects among foliage and branches, from Middle English titmose, compound of tit (“small bird”) and mose, from Old English māse (“titmouse”), from Proto-Germanic maisǭ (compare Dutch mees, German Meise, Old Norse meisingr, French mésange), from maisaz (“tiny, puny”) (compare Norwegian meis (“skinny weakling”)). Spelling as well as the plural form in imitation of the otherwise unrelated mouse. Common tits include the Bearded, the Blue, the Crested, the Coal, the Great, the Long-billed, the Marsh, and the Willow.


From A Year with Rilke, April 24 Entry
Hours of Childhood, from Fourth Duino Elegy

...Oh hours of childhood,
when each figure hid more than the past
and no future existed.
We were growing, of course, and we sometimes tried
to do it fast, half for the sake of those
whose grownupness was all they had.
Yet when we were by ourselves,
our play was in eternity. We dwelt
in the interval between world and toy,
that place created from the beginning of time
for the purest of actions.

Bather with Outstretched Arms
by Paul Cézanne

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.





*Goes back four seconds.