Word-Wednesday for August 28, 2024

And here is the Wannaskan Almanac with Word-Wednesday for August 28, 2024, the thirty-fifth Wednesday of the year, the tenth Wednesday of summer, the fourth Wednesday of August, and the two-hundred-forty-first day of the year, with one-hundred twenty-five days remaining.

 
Wannaska Phenology Update for August 28, 2024
It’s Puffball Time
Lycoperdon gemmatum and other common puffballs have a worldwide distribution beyond Wannaska, found even on Antarctica. Growing on the ground in deciduous, coniferous, and mixed woodlands under trees, on roadsides, in open areas, and even in urban areas, it usually grows in clusters. Puffballs are saprobic [/sa-PRŌ-bik/ adj., obtaining nutrients from decaying organic matter]. The genus name Lycoperdon is formed from the Latinized form of the Greek words lykos, meaning “wolf”, and perdesthai, meaning “to break wind” or wolf fart. Other colorful names include Devil's Snuffbox and Gem-studded Puffball.

August 28 Fickle Pickle Wednesday Menu Special: Potato Dumpling


August 28 Nordhem Wednesday Lunch: Updated daily, occasionally.


Earth/Moon Almanac for August 28, 2024
Sunrise: 6:36am; Sunset: 8:15pm; 3 minutes, 25 seconds less daylight today
Moonrise: 12:13am; Moonset: 5:59pm, waning crescent, 25% illuminated.


Temperature Almanac for August 28, 2024
                Average            Record              Today
High             73                     96                     75
Low              50                    30                     61

Death of a Fly
by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Sie sugh mit Gier verrätrisches Getränke...

He sucks with greed the treacherous attraction.
Won't budge, now once he tasted. Glued to stay.
Never enjoyed such utter satisfaction,
There with his members paralyzed. They'd play
Brisk on the little wing -- no more though, never.
Won't slick the little head, so pert and clever.
Life, in his fit of pleasure, slips away.
The tiny feet, enfeebling, go slack;
Toppled, he suck the more, goes blacker black,
Death in his thousand eyes like cataract.

August 28 Celebrations from National Day Calendar

• National Thoughtful Day
• National Red Wine Day
• National Power Rangers Day
• National Bow Tie Day
• Rainbow Bridge Remembrance Day
• National Cherry Turnover Day
• National Sport Sampling Day

August 28 Word Pun
Be a minimalist; it’s the least you can do.


August 28 Word Riddle
What's the latest goat dairy product craze from the Kfar HaHoresh kibbutz?*


August 28 The Devil’s Dictionary Word-Pram
FREEDOM, n., Exemption from the stress of authority in a beggarly half dozen of restraint's infinite multitude of methods. A political condition that every nation supposes itself to enjoy in virtual monopoly. Liberty. The distinction between freedom and liberty is not accurately known; naturalists have never been able to find a living specimen of either.

    Freedom, as every schoolboy knows,
    Once shrieked as Kosciusko fell;
    On every wind, indeed, that blows
    I hear her yell.

    She screams whenever monarchs meet,
    And parliaments as well,
    To bind the chains about her feet
    And toll her knell.

    And when the sovereign people cast
    The votes they cannot spell,
    Upon the pestilential blast
    Her clamors swell.

    For all to whom the power's given
    To sway or to compel,
    Among themselves apportion Heaven
    And give her Hell.
                        —Blary O'Gary


August 28 Etymology Word of the Week
coffee
/KÔ-fē/ n., a hot drink made from the roasted and ground seeds (coffee beans) of a tropical shrub, from "drink made from the ground and roasted seeds of a tree originally native to Arabia and Abyssinia," circa 1600, from Dutch koffie, from Turkish kahveh, from Arabic qahwah "coffee," which Arab etymologists connected with a word meaning "wine," but it is perhaps rather from the Kaffa region of Ethiopia, a home of the plant (coffee in Kaffa is called būno, which itself was borrowed into Arabic as bunn "raw coffee"). The early forms of the word in English indicate a derivation from Arabic or Turkish: chaoua (1598), cahve, kahui, etc. French café, German Kaffe are via Italian caffè. The first coffee-house in Mecca dates to the 1510s; the beverage was in Turkey by the 1530s. It appeared in Europe circa 1515-1519 and was introduced to England by 1650. By 1675 the country had more than 3,000 coffee houses and coffee had replaced beer as a breakfast drink, but its use there declined 18th century with the introduction of cheaper tea. In the American colonies, however, the tax on tea kept coffee popular.


August 28 Historic Events, Literary or Otherwise, from On This Day

• 1789 William Herschel discovers Saturn's moon Enceladus.
• 1830 First American built locomotive, "Tom Thumb", races a horse-drawn car from Stockton and Stokes stagecoach company from Baltimore to Ellicott Mills. Due to mechanical problems the horse won.
• 1837 Pharmacists John Lea & William Perrins manufacture Worcestershire Sauce.
• 1845 Scientific American magazine publishes its first issue.
• 1859 A geomagnetic storm causes the Aurora Borealis to shine so brightly that it is seen clearly over parts of USA, Europe, and even as far afield as Japan.
• 1884 First known photograph of a tornado is made near Howard, South Dakota .
• 1917 Ten suffragists arrested as they picket The White House.

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

• 1476 Kanō Motonobu, Japanese painter and calligrapher.
• 1673 Conrad Michael Schneider, German composer,.
• 1700 Carolomannus Pachschmidt, Austrian composer.
• 1749 Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, German writer.
• 1775 Sophie Gail, French composer.
• 1814 Sheridan Le Fanu, Irish writer.
• 1827 Teresa Milanollo, Italian composer.
• 1831 Fredrick Vilhelm Ludvig Norman, Swedish composer.
• 1833 Edward Burne-Jones, English Pre-Raphaelite painter and designer.
• 1842 Willem Linnig The Younger, Flemish painter and graphic artist.
• 1847 Norman Garstin, Irish artist.
• 1867 Umberto Giordano, Italian composer.
• 1872 Alfred Baldwin Sloan, American composer.
• 1881 Arne Eggen, Norwegian organist composer.
• 1885 Armas Maasalo, Finnish composer.
• 1885 Vance Palmer, Australian author.
• 1887 Daniel Zamudio, Colombian composer and folklorist.
• 1890 Ivor Gurney, English composer and poet.
• 1894 Karel Aubroeck, Belgian painter and sculptor.
• 1895 Václav Kaplický, Czech writer.
• 1896 Liam O'Flaherty, Irish writer.
• 1898 Ludwig Turek, German writer.
• 1901 Cees Kelk, Dutch writer.
• 1906 John Betjeman, English Poet Laureate.
• 1913 Robertson Davies, Canadian novelist.
• 1915 Tasha Tudor, American illustrator and children's books author.
• 1916 Jack [Holbrook] Vance, American science fiction author.
• 1924 Janet Frame, New Zealand novelist.
• 1925 Arkady Natanovich Strugatsky, Soviet-Russian science fiction author.
• 1925 Donald O'Connor, American dancer.
• 1932 Carlene Polite, American dancer, activist and author.
• 1948 Vonda N. McIntyre, American science fiction author.
• 1949 Imogen Cooper, British concert pianist.
• 1950  Ramie Leahy, Irish artist.
• 1952 Rita Dove, African-American poet.
• 1957 Chinese artist and activist.
• 1966 Jerry Fehily, Irish drummer.
• 1967 Frederick Kesner, Philippine-born Australian poet.

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

• adjelgid: /a-DEL-jəd/ n., an insect of the family Adelgidae, which comprises sap-feeding hemipteran insects resembling aphids.
• coppice: /KÄP-əs/ n., an area of woodland in which the trees or shrubs are, or formerly were, periodically cut back to ground level to stimulate growth and provide firewood or timber; v., cut back (a tree or shrub) to ground level periodically to stimulate growth.
• gubbins: /GəB-ə̇nz/ n., any bits and pieces, scraps; a foolish or futile person, simpleton.
• igniparous: /ig-NIIP-uh-ruhs/ adj., bringing forth fire.
• isostasy: /ī-SÄ-stə-sē/ n., general equilibrium in the earth's crust maintained by a yielding flow of rock material beneath the surface under gravitative stress; the quality or state of being subjected to equal pressure from every side.
• mardy: /MÄR-dē/ n., a spoilt child; fit of sullen or petulant ill temper; a childish sulk; adj., originally of a child: spoilt, sulky, whining, moody.
• machatunim: /machhhh-ah-tun-ĒM/ n., YIDDISH, the parents of my child’s spouse.
• namaqool: /ˈna-mə-ko͞ol/ adj., from Urdu, stinking; injudicious; irrational; immoderate; exorbitant.
• pussivant: /PUUSS-uh-vant/ v., to push or pull (a person) unceremoniously; to hustle.
• virid: /VIR-əd/ adj., vividly green; verdant.

August 28, 2024 Word-Wednesday Feature
thingamajig
/ˈTHiNG-ə-mə-jiɡ/ n., used to refer to or address a person or thing whose name one has forgotten, does not know, or does not wish to mention, from 1824, an arbitrary extension of thing (n.), used in reference to what the speaker is unable or unwilling to name or specify. Thing (n.) itself was used from 12th century as a generic or meaningless word in place of another or unknown word. In a world where Boomers make up a major portion of the population, the Oxford English Dictionary notes the increasing use of this word.

For those Boomers or writers about Boomers that want to expand their vocabulary, common synonyms include: dingus, doodad, doohickey, doojigger, gimcrack, gizmo, gubbins, jigamaree, kickumbob, thingamabob, thingammy, thingum, thingum-thangum, thingummy, thingy, whatchamacallit, whatchamacallum, whatnot, whatsit, and widgit.

It may be of some comfort to know that almost all languages seem to have a similar multisyllabic terms with rhythmic pronunciations:

• chingadera /cheen-gah-DEH-rah/ (Mexican Spanish)
• dingsbums /DINGS-booms/ (German)
• dittelidut /DIT-teh-lee-doot/ (Danish)
• habbijabbi /hah-bee-JAH-bee/ (Bengali)
• haghawagha /hah-ghah-WAH-ghah./ (Pashto)
• huppeldepup /HUP-puh-duh-pup/ (Dutch)
• intazinga /in-tah-ZEEN-gah/ (Zulu)
• naninani /nah-nee-NAH-nee/ (Japanese)
• shismoo /shee-SMEW/ (Arabic)
• yoke /yōk/ (Irish)
• zamazingo /zah-mah-ZEEN-go/ (Turkish)

If you or a loved one use a different term, please let us all know your version.


From A Year with Rilke, August 28 Entry
Like a Metal That Hasn’t Been Mined, from Book of Hours III, 2

You, mountain, here since mountains began,
slopes where nothing is built,
peaks that no one has named,
eternal snows littered with stars,
valleys in flower
offering fragrances of earth. . . .

Do I move inside you now?
Am I within the rock
like a metal that hasn't been mined?
Your hardness encloses me everywhere. . . .

Or is it fear
I am caught in? The tightening fear
of the swollen cities
in which I suffocate. . . .

Mont Sainte-Victoire
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.






*Cheeses of Nazareth.