Author: Rev. Joe Dirt

Posted on

Word of the Day – Acrostic

  • Noun: Acrostic
    1. a poem, word puzzle, or other composition in which certain letters in each line form a word or words.acrostic-illustration
  •  Synonyms:
    1. acronym
    2. cipher
    3. wordplay
  • Usage:
    1. Well, today, the Frederick News-Post responded, in an acrostic editorial originally scheduled to be published next Sunday.
  • Encountered:
    1. In a news story about an overly sensitive city councilman

To see more Words of the Day, visit this link: Words of the Day

Posted on

Word for the Day – Lugubrious

Lugubrious

  • adjective
    1. mournful, dismal, or gloomy, especially in an affected, exaggerated, or unrelieved manner
    2. looking or sounding sad and dismal.
  • synonyms:
    1. mournful, gloomy, sad, unhappy, doleful, glum, melancholy, woeful, miserable, woebegone, forlorn, somber, solemn, serious, sorrowful, morose, dour, cheerless, joyless, dismal;
      funereal, sepulchral;
  • After his wife left him, he walked around in a lugubrious condition for months.

To see more Words of Day, visit this link: Word of the Day

Posted on

Word for the Day – Gibbet

Gibbet

  • Noun:
    1. gallows
    2. an upright post with a projecting arm for hanging the bodies of executed criminals as a warning
  • Verb:
    1.  to expose to infamy or public scorn
    2. to put to death by hanging on a gibbet
  • Synonyms:
    1. gallows
    2. pillory
  • Usage:
    1.  The witch’s body was swinging in the wind from the gibbet for all to view.
  • Encountered:
    1. While reading Victor Hugo’s Notre Dame

To see more Words of Day, visit this link: Word of the Day

Posted on

Word for the Day – Dues ex machina

Dues ex machina

  • Noun:
    1. a character or thing that suddenly enters the story in a novel, play, movie, etc., and solves a problem that had previously seemed impossible to solve
    2. a god introduced by means of a crane in ancient Greek and Roman drama to decide the final outcome
  • Synonyms:
    1. contrivance
    2. gimmick
  • Usage:
    1. Some folks consider Poe’s abrupt ending of The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket a deus ex machina.
  • Encountered:
    1. A comment on my blog by the Dictionary Dude

To see more Words of Day, visit this link: Word of the Day

Posted on

Word of the Day – Avuncular

  • Adjective:
    1. of or relating to an uncle.
    2. of or relating to the relationship between men and their siblings’ children
    3. suggestive of an uncle especially in kindliness or geniality
  • Adverb
    1. avuncularly
  • Noun
    1. avuncularity
  •  Synonyms:
    1. counseling
    2. helping
    3. benevolent
    4. amiable
  • Usage:
    1. The avuncular CPA did not bat an eye when his client dumped a shoebox full of receipts on his desk.
  • Encountered:
    1.  It was a an interview on TV, but for the sake me I can not remember who was being interviewed and who was interviewing.

To see more Words of Day, visit this link: Word of the Day

Posted on

Word of the Day – Paradigm

Download as PDF

  • Noun:  Paradigm
    1. a typical example or pattern of something; a model.
    2. a set of linguistic items that form mutually exclusive choices in particular syntactic roles.
  •  Synonyms:
    1. model
    2. pattern
    3. example
    4. exemplar
    5. template
    6. standard
    7. prototype
    8. archetype
  • Usage:
    1. Ayn Rand’s paradigm, Objectivism, is  every man for themselves.
  • Encountered:
    1. Overused in business and educational circles

To see more Words of the Day, visit this link: Words of the Day

Posted on

Word of the Day –Laconic

  • Adjective:
    1. using or involving the use of a minimum of word
    2. concise to the point of seeming rude or mysterious
  • Adverb
    1. laconically
  •  Synonyms:
    1. terse
    2. concise
    3. pithy
    4. succinct
  • Usage:
    1. ‘”My lord, what are your orders in case you are killed?” “To do like me,” replied Wellington. To Clinton he said laconically, “To hold this spot to the last man.”.’
  • Encountered:
    1.  While reading Les Miserables

To see more Words of Day, visit this link: Word of the Day

Posted on

Word for the Day — Lassitude

  • Noun:
    1. a state of physical or mental weariness; lack of energy.
    2. a condition of listlessness
  • Synonyms:
    1. burnout
    2. collapse
    3. exhaustion,
    4. frazzle
    5. prostration
    6. tiredness
    7. weariness
  • Usage:
    1. “He had returned to prison, this time for having done right; he had quaffed fresh bitterness; disgust and lassitude were overpowering him; even the memory of the Bishop probably suffered a temporary eclipse, though sure to reappear later on luminous and triumphant.”
  • Encountered:
    1.  While reading Les Miserables

To see more Words of Day, visit this link: Word of the Day