Word du Jour

grandiloquent

2008-11-25T10:57:00.001-05:00

\gran-DIL-uh-kwuhnt\, adjective:
Lofty in style; pompous; bombastic.

"'Minister of Clean-'Em-Ups' is a rather grandiloquent title for our janitor, wouldn't you say?"

"By day I'm a grandiloquent man of letters, but by night I'll have you know I'm... something of a dandy." - Count Lou Ferrigno III, 1857

jejune

2008-11-24T00:01:00.000-05:00

\juh-JOON\, adjective:
1. Displaying or suggesting a lack of maturity; childish.

"Oh! Americans; how jejune!"

2. Lacking interest or significance; dull; meager; dry.

"Oh! Picasso; how jejune!"

3. Lacking in nutritive value.

"Oh! Cliff bars; how jejune!"

hoary

2008-11-21T00:01:00.000-05:00

\HOR-ee\, adjective:
1. White or gray with age

"Oh yeah?!" yelled shriveled old Mr. Chan from across the dance floor, gray hairs protruding wildly from his nostrils, "If I'm so HOARY, how come I can do the Charleston?"

2. Extremely old; remote in time past.

"Hey, the Sacred Ancient Temple of Lake Titicaca called; it wants its hoariness back!"

somnolent

2008-11-20T08:55:00.001-05:00

\SOM-nuh-luhnt\, adjective:

1. Sleepy; drowsy; inclined to sleep.

"...but no meet-up group was more somnolent than the WGA, or the 'Wine Guzzlers of America.'"

2. Tending to cause sleepiness or drowsiness.

"It takes talent to be a somnolent cigarette girl, but Daddy always said I was special."

brio

2008-09-09T13:42:00.000-04:00

\BREE-oh\, noun:
Enthusiastic vigor; vivacity; liveliness; spirit

"Genius, determination, strength, brio: These are the words that define the members of the Village People."

"But Charles had no shortage of brio. He literally had buckets of it. And that's not all he had buckets of...

I'll leave it you to decide what that last part means."

"You, me and brio, that makes three-o!"

canard

2008-09-08T12:47:00.001-04:00

\kuh-NAHRD\, noun:
1. An unfounded, false, or fabricated report or story.

“...And that was how I discovered that Bigfoot was nothing more than a canard,” reminisced the Loch Ness Monster.

2. A horizontal control and stabilizing surface mounted forward of the main wing of an aircraft.

“That's the last time I take a ride with Freddy ‘Delapidated Canards’ Jackson!”

tchotchke

2008-09-05T13:03:00.002-04:00

\CHOCH-kuh\, noun:
A trinket; a knickknack.

"Never judge a man by the size of his tchotchkes." - Ancient Chinese Proverb

"I can't get one producer to even look at my script for Tchotchkes: The Movie."

protean

2008-09-04T17:14:00.000-04:00

\PRO-tee-un; pro-TEE-un\, adjective:

1. Displaying considerable variety or diversity.
2. Readily assuming different shapes or forms.

"The new Handi-Vac 5000 is about as a protean as Lucifer himself, the King of Liars!"

"If you don't think Ted Koppel is protean, take another look at that alley cat that just walked by..."

deja vu

2008-08-13T11:16:00.001-04:00

/dey-zhah VOO/, noun

the illusion of having previously experienced something actually being encountered for the first time.

"Murdering this homeless man has left me with a strange feeling of deja vu. And not just because I murder a homeless man every night." - Anon.

"But in this restaurant, deja vu is a dish served up cold, next to an unforgiving slice of pie... usually apple." - Rod Serling, The Early Works Of...

deja vu

2008-08-12T16:42:00.000-04:00

raillery

2008-08-11T10:33:00.002-04:00

\RAY-luh-ree\, noun:

1. Good-humored banter or teasing.
2. An instance of good-humored teasing; a jest.

"But all the raillery in Canterbury couldn't distract Roderick from the new growth on Agatha's back."

"You know, if anyone ought to be able to take some raillery, it's a former P.O.W."

doff

2008-08-08T09:37:00.001-04:00

\DOF\, transitive verb:

1. To take off, as an article of clothing.
2. To tip or remove (one's hat).
3. To put aside; to rid oneself of.

“TODAY I PLAN TO PATENT MY INVENTION: THE SELF-DOFFING SOCK.” – Anon.

“Push the button when the fat man doffs his hat. Not a second sooner.”

“Allow me to doff this purple raincoat and these pink polka-dotted galoshes so I may tell you about some of the little-known benefits of investing in a Roth 401k.”

louche

2008-08-07T10:36:00.000-04:00

\LOOSH\, adjective:
Of questionable taste or morality; disreputable or indecent; dubious; shady.

“Charles, look. That muppet at the other end of the bar; there’s something... louche about him.”
“That sort of louche behavior might be fine and good at Roy Rogers, but dammit this is Chic-Fil-A!”

conurbation

2008-08-06T11:55:00.001-04:00

\kon-uhr-BAY-shuhn\, noun:
An aggregation or continuous network of urban communities.

“Here in this hellish, post-apocalyptic conurbation, gangs of babies rule the streets and the only thing left to eat is volleyball nets.”

“This is another fine conurbation you’ve gotten us into.” – Oliver Hardy to Stan Laurel in their final, commercially unsuccessful film, Laurel and Hardy Meet Urban Renewal

roue

2008-08-05T11:00:00.002-04:00

\roo-AY\, noun:
A man devoted to a life of sensual pleasure; a debauchee; a rake.

"But times are difficult for this struggling Roue Village in East Kenya, what with global Haagen Dasz shortages and the rising cost of Harvey Wallbangers."

"Some might call me a roue, but I prefer to think of myself as a man devoted to a life of sensual pleasure; a debauchee; a rake." - Thomas the Tank Engine

pestiferous

2008-08-04T10:24:00.001-04:00

\pes-TIF-uh-ruhs\, adjective:

1. Bearing or bringing disease.
2. Infected with or contaminated by a pestilential disease.
3. Morally evil or dangerous to society; pernicious.
4. Bothersome; troublesome; annoying.

"These are my two dirty, pestiferous children, and this is my mangey whore of a wife whose jaundiced, filth-encrusted vagina bore them onto this unfortunate and unsuspecting planet." - Jimmy Stewart, at the wrap party for Harvey

"Senator, I prefer non-pestiferous vegetables." - Anon.

eleemosynary

2008-08-01T10:56:00.000-04:00

\el-uh-MOS-uh-ner-ee\, adjective:
1. Of or for charity; charitable; as, "an eleemosynary institution."
2. Given in charity; having the nature of alms; as, "eleemosynary assistance."
3. Supported by or dependent on charity; as, "the eleemosynary poor."

"Don't you wish your boyfriend was slightly more eleemosynary like me?"

"Please, Marcus: these Funyons are eleemosynary."

quietus

2008-07-31T12:09:00.002-04:00

\kwy-EE-tuhs\, noun:

1. Final discharge or acquittance, as from debt or obligation.
2. Removal from activity; rest; death.
3. Something that serves to suppress or quiet.

"I have put a quietus upon the next door neighbor's Gay Luau. Rest assured, sweet Gondrick: Gay Luau sounds shall no longer disrupt your slumber."

"WHO DARES DISRUPT FROZEN WALT DISNEY'S CRYOGENIC QUIETUS?" - Frozen Walt Disney, shortly after having his cryogenic quietus disrupted

magniloquent

2008-07-30T11:56:00.001-04:00

magniloquent \mag-NIL-uh-kwent\, adjective:

Lofty or grandiose in speech or expression; using a high-flown style of discourse; bombastic.

"No, I didn't think your speech seemed particularly magniloquent... until you used the word 'magniloquent.'"

"You're more magniloquent than other encephalopods."

lissom

2008-07-29T11:51:00.001-04:00

\LISS-uhm\, adjective;
also spelled lissome:

1. Limber; supple; flexible.
2. Light and quick in action; nimble; agile; active.

"She moves with the lissom grace of a monster truck covered in pin-wheels."

"Your soul is kind, gentle, and lissom... IN BED!"

mephitic

2008-07-28T13:00:00.001-04:00

\muh-FIT-ik\, adjective:

offensive to the smell; as, mephitic odors.

"Santa Claus must be near by. I'd recognize that mephitic mix of B.O., egg nog, and stale cookie crumbs anywhere."

"I said I was anti-mephitic, not anti-semitic. Although sometimes I am that too, but it totally depends on the person, I swear. LOLz. Anyway, umm, more Gatorade?" - Winston Churchill

farrago

2008-07-23T10:05:00.003-04:00

\fuh-RAH-go; fuh-RAY-go\, noun:
A confused mixture; an assortment; a medley.

"This is the most dreadful farrago of vegetables I've ever seen in my life!"

"Jim Belushi, this autobiography of yours is nothing more than a farrago of go-nowhere anecdotes, mediocre smoothie recipes, and lukewarm Gene Shalit quotes!"

emolument

2008-07-22T12:52:00.002-04:00

\ih-MOL-yuh-muhnt\, noun:
The wages or perquisites arising from office, employment, or labor; gain; compensation.

"No emolument, please! Data entry is about the journey, not the reward."

"I plan to spend my weekly emolument on cheese, as I do every week, here in scenic Pittsburgh."

tatterdemalion

2008-07-21T14:20:00.000-04:00

\tat-uhr-dih-MAYL-yuhn; -MAY-lee-uhn\, noun:

1. A person dressed in tattered or ragged clothing; a ragamuffin.

"Show me a tatterdemalion, and I'll show you a person dressed in tattered or ragged clothing; a ragamuffin."

adjective: 1. Tattered; ragged.

"The tatterdemalion man signed the tatterdemalion divorce papers ending his long, tatterdemalion marriage."

posit

2008-07-18T15:32:00.003-04:00

\POZ-it\, transitive verb:
1. To assume as real or conceded.
2. To propose as an explanation; to suggest.
3. To dispose or set firmly or fixedly.

"All right, let's posit, for a moment, that golf IS fun to watch. That still doesn't explain this slaughtered pigeon!"

"Historians posit that I put the bomp in the bomp-a-bomp-a-bomp, no matter how many times I insist that I was merely responsible for the ram in the ram-a-lam-a-ding-dong."