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Intellectual House o' Pancakes Webdiary

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2008-09-08 - 11:17 p.m.

I like to think that I am a somewhat savvy vocabuleuse and word-wrangler, but I was readin' a novel today, and within the space of two pages, I came up against a bunch of words whose meanings I could only guess, using context clues.

Here they are. Can you define them w/o clicking on their meanings?

  • levantine (used poetically, not factually)
  • guichet (er, still not entirely clear what this means)
  • embonpoint
  • apotheosis

    In the same few pages I came across one of my favorite language quirks: a noun form of a word that usually expresses as an adjective, and I want to add this to my everyday-ish lexicon:

  • ebullition (which is also an emo record label)


    I hope now that the Times has written about Facebook, that the beautiful term "ambient awareness" does not become a cliche.


    Chubby Checker [site plays loud music--beware] has a new single, this sort of jangle-pop midtempo rocker. It's not good but it's really heartening to see a pushing-70 fellow trying to change his act and stay current, and not feel obligated to cover standards.

    thoughts? (20 comments so far)

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