Word-Wednesday for September 3, 2025

And here is the Wannaskan Almanac with Word-Wednesday for September 3, 2025, the twenty-ninth Wednesday of the year, the eleventh Wednesday of summer, the first Wednesday of September, and the two-hundred forty-sixth day of the year, with one-hundred nineteen days remaining. Brought to you by Bead Gypsy Studio & Scandinavian  Shoppe  - Purchase 1 Piece of Jewelry at Full Price, and Get the 2nd Piece 50% off (second piece of equal or lesser value).

 
Wannaska Phenology Update for September 3, 2025
Yes You Did
September steps in wearing a cloak of gold-threaded green, and with it, our ears are tuned to one particular insect that holds dominion over the soundscape: the katydid (Pterophylla camellifolia). The katydid’s voice is not just noise but onomatopoeia incarnate: ka-ty-did, ka-ty-didn’t — an endless argument stitched into the night air. This verbal duel is as much about late-summer as school buses and cooling mornings. Their song is generated as they stridulate [/ˈstrij-ə-lāt/ v., (of an insect, especially a male cricket or grasshopper) make a shrill sound by rubbing the legs, wings, or other parts of the body together] — the rubbing of one wing against the other—which is one of those scientific words that sounds just like what it means: a scratchy rasp that transforms into syllables.

While fireflies have gone dark and meadowlarks have grown quiet, the katydids keep our ears awake — a reminder that words themselves were once imitations of sounds. Linguists call it phonetic mimicry; nature calls it survival. Katydids sing for mates, not metaphors — but humans can’t help but hear poetry in their performance.

In northwest Minnesota this time of year, katydids thrive in the edges: hedgerows, tall grasses, thickets—anywhere the late-summer leaves still make a room of green. Their song is seasonal punctuation: not the full stop of winter, not yet, but the long dash of summer’s drawn-out farewell. So tonight, step outside, pause, and listen. Somewhere in the cricket chorus, a katydid is rehearsing its eternal word-battle, and you, lucky phenologist of the ear, get to eavesdrop.

September 3 Fickle Pickle Wednesday Menu Special: Potato Dumpling


September 3 Nordhem Wednesday Lunch: Updated daily, occasionally.


Earth/Moon Almanac for September 3, 2025
Sunrise: 6:44am; Sunset: 8:03pm; 3 minutes, 29 seconds less daylight today
Moonrise: 6:30pm; Moonset: 1:13am, waxing gibbous, 75% illuminated.


Temperature Almanac for September 3, 2025
                Average            Record              Today
High             72                     96                     54
Low              49                     25                     36

September
by Helen Hunt Jackson

    The golden-rod is yellow;
    The corn is turning brown;
    The trees in apple orchards
    With fruit are bending down.
    The gentian's bluest fringes
    Are curling in the sun;
    In dusty pods the milkweed
    Its hidden silk has spun.
    The sedges flaunt their harvest,
    In every meadow nook;
    And asters by the brook-side
    Make asters in the brook.
    From dewy lanes at morning
    the grapes' sweet odors rise;
    At noon the roads all flutter
    With yellow butterflies.
    By all these lovely tokens
    September days are here,
    With summer's best of weather,
    And autumn's best of cheer.
    But none of all this beauty
    Which floods the earth and air
    Is unto me the secret
    Which makes September fair.
    'T is a thing which I remember;
    To name it thrills me yet:
    One day of one September
    I never can forget.


September 3 Celebrations from National Day Calendar

• U.S. Bowling League Day
• National Welsh Rarebit Day
• National Skycraper Day

September 3 Word Pun

Sven once got sent out of class at school for being too sarcastic. His teacher tried threaten him by saying, “Vat vould your parents say if I called them?!"

Sven replied, “…Hello?"

Vandals broke into Sven’s shed stole his broken scale, but they won’t get a weigh with it.

September 3 Word Riddle
When do the cars know it’s time to drive onto the boat?*

A Chairman Joe original

September The Devil’s Dictionary Word-Pram
PICTURE, n., A representation in two dimensions of something wearisome in three.

    "Behold great Daubert's picture here on view—
    Taken from Life." If that description's true,
    Grant, heavenly Powers, that I be taken, too.
                        —Jali Hane


September 3 Etymology Word of the Week
student
/STo͞o-d(ə)nt/ n., a person who is studying at a school or college, from late 14th century, studient, "studious person, one who pursues knowledge," from Old French estudiant "student, scholar, one who is studying" (Modern French étudiant), noun use of present participle of estudiier, from Medieval Latin studiare "to study," from Latin studium. Forms without an -i- or -y- in the middle appear by early 15th century. Also see e-.

An Old English word for it was leorningcild "student, disciple," in modern form learning-child. In modern use (from circa 1900) it tends to mean "scholar enrolled in an institute of primary or secondary learning." For "students collectively," studentry has been tried (1830).


September 3 Historic Events, Literary or Otherwise, from On This Day

• 1752 Britain and the British Empire (including the American colonies) adopt the Gregorian Calendar, losing 11 days; people riot, thinking the government has stolen 11 days of their lives.
• 1812 The world's first factory to preserve food in tinned iron containers (Donkin, Hall, and Gamble) opens in London, England, to supply food to the Royal Navy.
• 1833 New York Sun, the first daily newspaper, begins publishing.
• 1838 Frederick Douglass escapes from slavery disguised as a sailor.
• 1881 Anton Bruckner completes his 6th Symphony.
• 1908 James Barrie's What Every Woman Knows premieres.
• 1912 Arnold Schoenberg's Fünf Orchesterstücke (Five Pieces for Orchestra) premieres.
• 1923 Dorothy Donnelly's Poppy premieres.

September 3 Author/Artist/Character Birthdays, from On This Day

• 1568 Adriano Banchieri, Italian organist, composer, poet.
• 1695 Pietro Locatelli, Italian violinist and composer.
• 1778 Jean Nicolas Auguste Kreutzer, French violinist and composer.
• 1789 Edmund Passy, Swedish composer.
• 1791 Francisco Acuña de Figueroa, Uruguayan poet.
• 1803 Alexander Gurilyov, Russian composer.
• 1810 Paul Kane, Irish painter.
• 1840 Jacob Christian Fabricius, Danish composer.
• 1845  Louise Herschman Mannheimer, Czech writer.
• 1849 Sarah Orne Jewett, American author.
• 1864 Hale A. VanderCook, American composer.
• 1893 Florrie Rodrigo, Dutch dancer, choreographer.
• 1897 Francisco Mignone, Brazilian composer,.
• 1897 Sally Benson, American writer.
• 1905 Robert Ruthenfranz, German composer.
• 1915 Abel Ehrlich, Israeli composer.
• 1915 Knut Nystedt, Norwegian organist, choral composer.
• 1922 Rosendo Ejercito Santos, Filipino composer.
• 1922 Steffan Danielsen, Faroese painter.
• 1923 Mort Walker, American cartoonist.
• 1925 Bengt Lindström, Swedish artist.
• 1925 Shoista Mullodzhanova, Shashmakom singer.
• 1926 Alison Lurie, American novelist.
• 1926 John Robert Jones [John Dalmas], American science fiction author.
• 1931 Rudolf Kelterborn, Swiss composer.
• 1934 Xavier Darasse, French organist and composer.
• 1938 Caryl Churchill, English playwright.
• 1940 Eduardo Galeano, Uruguayan writer.
• 1941 Sergei Dovlatov, Russian writer.
• 1943 Mick Farren, English science fiction author.

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

• bibliosmia: /bib-lee-OZ-mee-uh/ n., the pleasant, distinct aroma of books, whether new or old. This scent is created by volatile organic compounds (VOCs) released from the paper, ink, and adhesives as they slowly decompose or break down over time.
• dumble: /DUM-buhl/ n., a deep shady valley or hollow; a dell, a dingle; (in later use) esp. a relatively narrow and steep-sided valley, typically with wooded sides and a stream running through it.
• jubbe: /JOO-bee/ n., a large vessel for liquor.
• myrmecoid: /MURR-muh-koyd/ adj., resembling an ant in form or behavior.
• picknickery: n., the practice of holding picnics; a collection of things contributed from various sources; a miscellany; the items that make up a picnic, considered collectively.
• retrorse: /reh-TRORS/ adj., turned or bent backward or in a direction other than that which is expected.
• scrofulous: /SKRÒ-fyə-ləs/ adj., having a diseased run-down appearance; morally contaminated; of, relating to, or affected with scrofula, tuberculosis of lymph nodes especially in the neck.
• turnverein: /TəRN-və-rīn/ n., an athletic club.
• voisinage: /vwa-zih-NAZH/ n., a neighborhood or district. A vicinity or nearby area. 
• wen: /wen/ n., a boil or other swelling or growth on the skin, especially a sebaceous cyst.

September 3, 2025 Word-Wednesday Feature
A Nose for Words
Late summer/early fall is a season of rich aromas, and biblisomia got us thinking about smell words. Human noses have always outpaced human vocabularies. Smell, that most primal of senses, is notoriously difficult to describe: sight gives us shapes and colors, sound gives us notes and timbres, but smell is elusive—often explained only through comparisons. Many authors, including Nabokov in Lolita, use smell as a consistent them. For more such books, explore this fascinating podcast. The ancient Greeks struggled too: osmē meant simply “odor,” with no sharp divide between pleasant and foul. Latin took the first step in refinement: odor (neutral), fragrantia (pleasant), and fetor (unpleasant). From these roots, Romance and Germanic languages spun their own olfactory lexicons.

By the Middle Ages, English borrowed heavily from French (tout à fait): fragrance, perfume, and redolence wafted in with courtly airs, while stench, reek, and rank clung to the common tongue. The Renaissance, with its fascination for sensory experience, gave us aroma (through Greek and Latin), and the Enlightenment refined terms like bouquet for wine.

Yet English remained curiously smell-starved. Where taste boasts salty, sweet, sour, bitter, umami, smell has mostly metaphors: earthy, floral, smoky, musky. Still, poets and perfumers worked hard to coin and preserve evocative words, from the charming ambrosial to the stomach-turning miasmic. The history of smell-words is thus a history of human culture: our desire to elevate delight, our disgust at decay, and our ongoing struggle to capture in words what the nose knows instantly. Today we explore some of the more vivid, well-nourished, and essential English smell-words:

Twelve Words for Pleasant Smells

• aredolent: /AIR-uh-doh-luhnt/ adj., faintly fragrant; carrying a delicate scent.
• balmy: /BAH-mee/ adj., soft, soothing, and pleasantly aromatic, often with a gentle floral or herbal scent.
• caprifolic: /KAP-rih-fah-lik/ adj., smelling like honeysuckle; sweet and floral.
• evanescent: /ev-uh-NESS-ənt/ adj., fleetingly fragrant; a delicate, quickly fading scent.
• flinderscent: /FLIN-der-sent/ adj., giving off a fleeting, glimmering fragrance.
• nard: /NAHRD/ n., a biblical perfume made from spikenard; rich, spicy, and musky.
• nidorous: /NID-uh-russ/ adj., having a savory, appetizing smell (often of roasted food).
• odoriferous: /oh-duh-RIF-er-əs/ adj., carrying a pleasant fragrance (originally neutral but came to mean agreeable).
• redolent: /RED-uh-lənt/ adj., strongly reminiscent or suggestive of a fragrance; often used figuratively.
• savory: /SAY-vuh-ree/ adj., aromatic and appetizing, especially applied to herbs or cooked foods.
• suscitant: /SUSS-i-tənt/ adj., stimulating scent that awakens or arouses.
• zymotic: /zai-MOT-ik/ adj., pleasantly fermentative smell, as of yeast or rising bread.

Twelve Words for Unpleasant Smells

• caprylic: /kuh-PRIL-ik/ adj., reeking of rancid goat fat or sour dairy.
• fetid/foetid: /FEH-tid/FEE-tid/ adj., revoltingly malodorous, rotting, decayed.
• hircine: /HER-seen or HUR-syne/ adj., smelling like a goat; musky and pungent.
• miasmic: /mai-AZ-mik/ adj., unhealthy, noxious, swampy stench; historically linked to disease.
• mephitic: /meh-FIT-ik/ adj., foul-smelling, poisonous gas or vapor.
• noisome: /NOY-səm/ adj., extremely unpleasant, offensive stench.
• ossifragrant: /OSS-ih-fray-gruhnt/ adj., giving off the acrid, unpleasant smell of burning bone.
• putrid: /PYOO-trid/ adj., decayed and rotting odor, especially of meat.
• rammish: /RAM-ish/ adj., strong, rank animal-like smell.
• sulfurous: /SUL-fur-us/ adj., pungent smell of brimstone; volcanic, eggy stench.
• uliginous: /yoo-LIJ-i-nus/ adj., swampy, dank, and moldy smell.
• virulent: /VEER-yoo-lənt/ adj., acrid, intensely poisonous stench; metaphorically toxic.
• whiffy: /WIF-ee/ adj., slangy term for a noticeable bad odor; light but disagreeable smell.

From A Year with Rilke, September 3 Entry
Orpheus, Eurydice, Hermes (I), from New Prams

It was the mysterious mine of souls.
They threaded their way through its darkness
like veins of silver. Between roots
sprang up the blood that flows to the living
and in the dark it looked as hard as porphyry.
Nothing else was red.

Rocks were there
and forests of shadows. Bridges over chasms
and a vast, depthless lake of grey
that extended above its distant bed
like rain clouds over the land.
On either side of the pale ribbon of that one path
meadows unfolded, endlessly opening.

Rock Forest of Fontainebleu
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.






*When they hear the ferry moan.