Word-Wednesday for October 1, 2025

And here is the Wannaskan Almanac with Word-Wednesday for October 1, 2025, the sixteenth Wednesday of the year, the second Wednesday of fall, the first Wednesday of October, and the two-hundred seventy-fourth day of the year, with ninety-one days remaining.

 
Wannaska Phenology Update for October 1, 2025
Lion's Mane Time
Hericium erinaceus, commonly known as lion's mane, yamabushitake, bearded tooth fungus, or bearded hedgehog, is a species of tooth fungus that tends to grow in a single clump with dangling spines longer than 1⁄2 inch. Native to North America and Eurasia, these mushrooms are common during late summer and autumn on hardwoods, particularly American beech and maple. It is typically saprophytic, feeding on dead trees, but it can also be found on living trees, usually in association with a wound. Both the Latin genus name Hericium and the species name erinaceus mean "hedgehog" in Latin. This is also reflected by the German name, Igel-Stachelbart (literally, "hedgehog-goatee"), and some of its common English names, such as bearded hedgehog and hedgehog mushroom. The edible fruiting bodies are common in gourmet cooking, with young specimens considered the best. Alongside shiitake (Lentinus edodes) and oyster (Pleurotus ostreatus) mushrooms, H. erinaceus is used as a specialty mushroom in recipes.

October 1 Fickle Pickle Wednesday Menu Special: Potato Dumpling


October 1 Nordhem Wednesday Lunch: Updated daily, occasionally.


Earth/Moon Almanac for October 1, 2025
Sunrise: 7:24am; Sunset: 7:03pm; 3 minutes, 33 seconds less daylight today
Moonrise: 4:58pm; Moonset: 12:05am, waxing gibbous, 59% illuminated.


Temperature Almanac for October 1, 2025
                Average            Record              Today
High             59                     87                     81
Low              38                     16                     60

Sonnet 73: That time of year thou mayst in me behold
By William Shakespeare

That time of year thou mayst in me behold
When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang
Upon those boughs which shake against the cold,
Bare ruin'd choirs, where late the sweet birds sang.
In me thou see'st the twilight of such day
As after sunset fadeth in the west,
Which by and by black night doth take away,
Death's second self, that seals up all in rest.
In me thou see'st the glowing of such fire
That on the ashes of his youth doth lie,
As the death-bed whereon it must expire,
Consum'd with that which it was nourish'd by.
This thou perceiv'st, which makes thy love more strong,
To love that well which thou must leave ere long.

October 1 Celebrations from National Day Calendar

• National Jiffy Mix Day
• National Walk to School Day
• National Pumpin Seed Day
• National Coffee with a Cop Day
• National Fire Pup Day
• National Pumpkin Spice Day
• National Green City Day
• National Black Dog Day
• National Homemade Cookies Day
• Random Acts of Poetry Day
• World Vegetarians Day
• International Coffee Day
• International Day of Older Persons

October 1 Word Pun
New Cook Book:
Roasting Beef
by Grey V. Browining


October 1 Word Riddle
What do you use to mend a jack-o-lantern?*


October 1 The Devil’s Dictionary Word-Pram
OLD, adj. In that stage of usefulness which is not inconsistent with general inefficiency, as an old man. Discredited by lapse of time and offensive to the popular taste, as an old book.

    "Old books? The devil take them!" Goby said.
    "Fresh every day must be my books and bread."
    Nature herself approves the Goby rule
    And gives us every moment a fresh fool.
                    —Harley Shum


October 1 Etymology Word of the Week
hunger
/HəNG-ɡər/ n., a feeling of discomfort or weakness caused by lack of food, coupled with the desire to eat, from Old English hunger, hungor "unease or pain caused by lack of food, debility from lack of food, craving appetite," also "famine, scarcity of food in a place," from Proto-Germanic hungraz, which according to Watkins is probably from Proto-Indo-European root kenk "to suffer hunger or thirst" (source also of Sanskrit kakate "to thirst;" Lithuanian kanka "pain, ache; torment, affliction;" Greek kagkanos "dry," polykagkes "drying"). From circa 1200 as "a strong or eager desire" (originally spiritual). Hunger strike attested from 1885; earliest references are to prisoners in Russia. Germanic cognates include Old Frisian hunger, Old Saxon hungar, Old High German hungar, Old Norse hungr, German hunger, Dutch honger, Gothic huhrus.


October 1 Historic Events, Literary or Otherwise, from On This Day

• 1843 News of the World begins publication in London.
• 1847 Maria Mitchell discovers a non-naked-eye comet using a two-inch telescope, earning fame as Miss Mitchell's Comet.
• 1867 Karl Marx publishes Das Kapital in Berlin, describing the capitalist system, its instability, and its tendency toward self-destruction.
• 1868 Little Women by Louisa May Alcott is published.
• 1869 First postcards are issued in Vienna, Austria.
• 1880 John Philip Sousa becomes the new director of the US Marine Corps Band.
• 1888 National Geographic magazine is published for the first time.
• 1890 US Congress creates Weather Bureau.
• 1908 Henry Ford introduces the Model T car, priced at $825 .
• 1960 Wole Soyinka's play A Dance of the Forests is first performed.
• 1986 Canadian children's author Robert Munsch publishes Love You Forever.

October 1 Author/Artist/Character Birthdays, from On This Day

• 1507 Giacomo Barozzi da Vignola, Italian architect.
• 1620 Nicolaes Pietersz Berchem, Dutch landscape painter and etcher.
• 1644 Jean Rousseau, French violist, composer.
• 1652 Madame d'Aulnoy [Marie-Catherine Le Jumel de Barneville], French author who coined the term fairytales.
• 1724 Giovanni Battista Cirri, Italian cellist and composer.
• 1735 Johann Baptist Christoph Toeschi, German composer.
• 1771 Pierre Baillot, French violinist and composer.
• 1791 Sergey Aksakov, Russian novelist.
• 1808 Eduard Sobolewski, Polish-American violinist and composer.
• 1832 Henry Clay Work, American composer.
• 1841 Anatol' Vakhnyanyn, Ukrainian composer.
• 1842 Charles Cros, French inventor and poet.
• 1865 Paul Dukas, French composer.
• 1872 Israël Querido, Dutch poet and novelist.
• 1881 Leonid Sabaneyev, Russian composer.
• 1885 Louis Untermeyer, American poet.
• 1893 Faith Baldwin, American author.
• 1893 Marianne Brandt, German painter, sculptor and metalworker.
• 1894 Ricardo Castillo, Guatemalan composer.
• 1899 Lajos Bárdos, Hungarian conductor, composer.
• 1908 Herman D. Koppel, Danish pianist and composer.
• 1917 René de Rooy, Surinamese and Antillean poet.
• 1920  Zdeněk Rotrek, Czech poet.
• 1930 Richard Harris, Irish writer.
• 1931 Sylvano Bussotti, Italian composer, filmmaker and novelist.
• 1931 Jiří Suchý, Czech poet.
• 1933 Olga Pozzi Escot, Peruvian-American composer.
• 1936 Edward Villella, American ballet dancer.
• 1950 Marge Simpson.
• 1953 John Hegley, British comedian, songwriter and poet.
• 1976 Antonio Roybal, American painter and sculptor.
• 1981 Deborah James, British teacher, journalist, author.

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

• aequoreal: /ee-KWOR-ee-uhl/ adj., marine, oceanic.
• batrachophagous: /bat-​ruh-​KOH-f​uh-​jus/ adj., feeding on frogs; pertaining to one that devours frogs.
• crackling: /KRA-k(ə-)liŋ/ n., the crisp residue left after the rendering of lard from pig fat or the frying or roasting of pig skin.
• daiman: /ˈDĪ-mōn/ n., variant spelling of daemon, a divinity or supernatural being of a nature between gods and humans.
• frog: /frawg/ v., to pull apart a piece of knitting to rework it or to correct a mistake.
• fuggan: /FUG-uhn/ n., any of various types of dough cake made with flour or meal mixed with fat, esp. a sweet cake containing currants.
• narthex: /NÄR-THeks/ n., an antechamber, porch, or distinct area at the western entrance of some early Christian churches, separated off by a railing and used by catechumens, penitents, etc.
• spalt: /spawlt/ v., of wood: to undergo a partial alteration in color as a result of fungal decay, manifesting esp. as dark lines along the grain and valued as a decorative effect.
• tenné: /TE-nē/ n., orange-brown, as a stain used in blazoning.
• whittawing: n., a method of tanning leather that uses alum and salt to produce whitleather.

October 1 2025 Word-Wednesday Feature
Haves and Have-Nots
have: /hav/ v., possess, own, or hold, from Old English habban "to own, possess; be subject to, experience," from Proto-Germanic habejanan (source also of Old Norse hafa, Old Saxon hebbjan, Old Frisian habba, German haben, Gothic haban "to have"), from Proto-Indo-European root kap- "to grasp." Not related to Latin habere, despite similarity in form and sense; the Latin cognate is capere "seize. Sense of "possess, have at one's disposal" (I have a book) is a shift from older languages, where the thing possessed was made the subject and the possessor took the dative case (as in Latin est mihi liber "I have a book," literally "there is to me a book"). Used as an auxiliary in Old English, too (especially to form present perfect tense); the word has taken on more functions over time; Modern English he had better would have been Old English him (dative) wære betere.

We might have, but we increasingly do not. Miguel de Cervantes had Don Quixote's squire, Sancho Panza, describe our situation:

As a grandmother of mine used to say, there are only two families in the world, the Haves and the Have-Nots. 

Or in Spanish: el tener and el no tener — literally “the having” and “the not having.” Credit for haves and have-nots in English belongs to the English writer Peter Motteux, who provided the first English translation of Don Quixote in 1700. But you get the point.

Throughout history, the Haves have rendered opinions about the traits and habits of the Have-Nots, with such observations so off-base—or so self-serving that many writers have seriously questioned the ability of the Haves to understand the Have-Nots. Today, Word-Wednesday looks at a few of those words...

Work is no disgrace: it is idleness which is a disgrace…. If you work, the idle will soon envy you as you grow rich, for fame and renown attend on wealth.

Hesiod

Idle hands make one poor, but diligent hands bring riches.

Proverbs 10:4

The rich are never threatened by the poor—they do not notice them.

Marie de France

One half of the world cannot understand the pleasures of the other.

Jane Austen

For those who are not hungry, it is easy to palaver about the degradation of charity.

Charlotte Brontë

When you stand in front of me and look at me, what do you know of the griefs that are in me and what do I know of yours?

Franz Kafka

It is an unfortunate human failing that a full pocket-book often groans more loudly than an empty stomach.

Franklin D. Roosevelt

When too few have too much, and too many have too little, the stage is set for the decline of us all.

Blayney Colmore

If one does not understand a person, one tends to regard him as a fool.

Carl Jung

To blame the poor for subsisting on welfare has no justice unless we are also willing to judge every rich member of society by how productive he or she is. Taken individual by individual, it is likely that there’s more idleness and abuse of government favors among the economically privileged than among the ranks of welfare recipients.

Norman Mailer

One of the primary tests of the mood of a society at any given time is whether its comfortable people tend to identify, psychologically, with the power and achievements of the very successful or with the needs and sufferings of the underprivileged.

Richard Hofstadter

You can only understand people if you feel them in yourself.

John Steinbeck

Wouldn't you think some sociologist would have done a comparative study by now to prove, as I have always suspected, that there is a higher proportion of Undeserving Rich than Undeserving Poor?

Molly Ivins

To understand another human being you must gain some insight into the conditions which made him what he is.

Margaret Bourke-White

The best way to understand somebody else is to put yourself in his place.

Clarence Darrow

For that is one of the best things about love: the feeling of being wrapped, like a gift, in understanding.

Anatole Broyard

The trouble is that rich people, well-to-do people, very often don't really know who the poor are; and that is why we can forgive them, for knowledge can only lead to love, and love to service. And so, if they are not touched by them, it's because they do not know them.

Mother Teresa

There are two kinds of people in the world: those who live poor on a lot and those who live rich on a little.

Marcelene Cox

From A Year with Rilke, October 1 Entry
Autumn Day, from Book of Images

Lord, the time has come. Summer was abundant.
Cast your shadows over the sundial,
across the fields unleash your winds.

Command the final fruits to ripen.
Grant them two more southern days,
bring them to fullness and press
their last sweetness into the heavy wine.

Who now has no house will not build one.
Who now is alone will remain alone,
will read into the night, write long letters,
and, restless, wander streets
where leaves are blowing.

Autumn
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.






*A pumpkin patch.