Dictionary.com gives two definitions of “feckless”:
ineffective; incompetent; futile: feckless attempts to repair the plumbing.
having no sense of responsibility; indifferent; lazy.
I’m more interested in the second definition, because I like CALLING someone feckless, especially to their face. It’s an insult! It’s like calling someone a child, except using a word a feckless person wouldn’t [...]
A festoon is a festive ornament. So to be “festooned” means to be decorated in festive ornaments. A festoon used to be a specific kind of ornament, in which flowers, foliage, and fruit were fastened to and suspended by long ribbons. It has now come to mean any type of celebratory ornamentation.
Considering how our calendar [...]
If I met the man who invented this word, I would give him a kiss and then suck his balls dry. And I’m not even remotely gay. If the inventor is actually a woman things could get messy and we might even spawn a whole new strain of venereal disease.
Every single time I see the [...]
I hate “aubergine” when it’s used to describe an eggplant. But I love it when it’s used to describe a color! Vegetables, to me, are not royal. They are humble, and should be spoken of with humble words, such as eggplant. Peasants eat eggplants. And we are all peasants.
But color, on the other hand, is [...]
“Raw” is the rawest word I know. “Raw” is intense. For a word with no hard sounds, it still sounds hardcore.
Its origins are no less astonishing, with connections to Latin, Greek, Proto-Germanic, Proto-Indo-European, Old Norse, Old Irish, Sanskrit, and Slavic. The need to describe bloody, exposed and uncooked flesh goes back to the dawn of [...]
There is a lot to love about this word.
How many words can boast three E’s in the first four letters? (Okay, epee is one, but that word is lame).
It has two Y’s, and we all love Y because it’s the underdog of the vowels; everybody wants to see more Y (it sleeps with both [...]