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Post by Verbivore on May 19, 2020 21:39:37 GMT
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Post by Little Jack Horner on May 20, 2020 18:01:13 GMT
Vv often provides samples of new-to-him words. I suspect most visitors to this forum also notice new words. Here are some I have discovered. They are all ones that I have found useful.
neanimorphic = looking younger than true age agerasia = the property of looking younger than true age mundivagant = a wandering around the world fomite = an inanimate surface harbouring infective organisms ruelle = the space between the bed and the wall thanatosis = of an animal, playing dead to escape predation hapax legomenon = a word which only occurs once in any corpus of literature
Also, not so useful, pavid = fearful or timid, which I came across when being subjected to a comprehension test. I thought it might be something to do with peafowl (I happened to know that the genus name for Asian peafowl is Pavo) but not so. The word was used fairly frequently in the early nineteenth century but rarely since so I wasn’t too upset not to know it (https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=pavid&year_start=1800&year_end=2000&corpus=15&smoothing=5&share=&direct_url=t1%3B%2Cpavid%3B%2Cc0).
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Post by Verbivore on May 20, 2020 22:31:20 GMT
What a bonus day! I knew only two of those terms: thanatosis and hapax legomenon.
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Post by Verbivore on May 24, 2020 3:42:50 GMT
A major buzzword in recent decades has been sustainability / sustainable. Now it seems one can die sustainably. I’d have thought death to be very sustainable. It’s a minor niggle, somewhat akin to my beef about “organic” vegetables. Of course they’re bloody well organic!
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Post by Verbivore on May 25, 2020 0:25:08 GMT
Viral language – coronacoinages – and whyI particularly liked the German compound Öffnungsdiskussionsorgien (‘opening discussion orgies’) used to describe the seemingly endless policy debates over reopening. All crises seem to lead to Öffnungsdiskussionsorgien: a “let’s have another gabfest while we avoid doing anything” approach – all the while quaffing virtual quarantinis.
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Post by Verbivore on May 25, 2020 23:37:09 GMT
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Post by Little Jack Horner on May 26, 2020 10:33:57 GMT
Vv was writing about the status of “sustainably” as a buzzword. May I complain about some others?
community – we have community libraries, community fire service, etc, etc. top priority – customer safety is always a company’s top priority after every disaster. incredibly – everything these days seems to be incredibly something or other. It just means “very”.
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Post by Verbivore on May 27, 2020 6:46:28 GMT
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Post by Twoddle on May 27, 2020 9:21:52 GMT
I believe it does, but I always use "noon" and "midnight" to avoid confusion.
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Post by Little Jack Horner on May 27, 2020 9:31:22 GMT
It is strange that my son wrote to me only yesterday about this midday topic. Wikipedia has a lot to say about it at the end of this article: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/12-hour_clock. I go with the ISO.
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Post by Verbivore on May 27, 2020 13:14:07 GMT
It is strange that my son wrote to me only yesterday about this midday topic. Wikipedia has a lot to say about it at the end of this article: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/12-hour_clock. I go with the ISO. Interesting stuff at that link, LJH. Thanks. Almost as an aside, this caught my eye as I scrolled through: Minutes ":01" to ":09" are usually pronounced as oh one to oh nine (nought or zero can also be used instead of oh).
That harks back to an earlier discussion here on O(h) versus Zero in, e.g. spoken phone numbers. On one’s style/s of clock:I’ve always liked the non-ambiguity of the 24-hr clock (and only two people have ever turned up 12 hours out of sync for one of my parties – just two out of hundreds over a lifetime of using the 24-hr time system on my invitations and in my diaries). It also eliminates the need for noon/midnight markers. For decades now all my sundials, whether analog or digital, have been 24 hour – and I include a wall clock, which was really just a 12-hour analog piece that also had, in a different script or a subscript, the numbers for 13–23 placed between the usual 1–12. It rotated twice in 24 hours, rather than being a more collectible "proper" Italian 24-hours-in-one-sweep model. Let’s see … the timepieces in my life today – From the following, you could never consider me an anal-retentive clock-watching Virgo – ahem! (You couldn't really, could you? LOL)1 x analog wristwatch (super-plain, all black, piss-elegant minimalist) – crystal powered, no numerals, simple markers for 3, 6, 9, and 12. Can function as 12- or 24-hour timepiece (2 x 12-hr cycles). Worn maybe thrice yearly on dress occasions. I’m usually watchless – and rarely late. 1 x battery-powered analog wall clock with two sets of hour markings, thereby giving one the options of reading it as a 12- or 24-hour piece. It has reached that stage of its life where it's dead accurate twice a day, but I don't want to chuck it out. Yet. 1 x German classic-car analog clock, 12-hour setting only, car-battery powered 1 x digital clock in shopping trolley (Ford ute), set to 24-hour mode, car-battery powered 6 x digital clocks, 24-hour setting, on phones 1 x analog clock, 24-hour setting, on Blackberry 3 x digital clocks, 24-hour setting, on desktop Macs 1 x digital clock, 24-hour setting, on desk 1 x digital clock, 24-hour setting, at bedside 7 x digital clocks, 24-hour setting, on computer / comms peripherals 6 x digital clocks, 24-hour setting, on musical equipment 5 x digital clocks, 24-hour setting, on cookers / ovens / appliances I think that’s 34 timepieces, comprising four analog and 30 digital, all but one of them set / settable to 24-hr mode.
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Post by Dave Miller on May 27, 2020 14:34:14 GMT
I”m happy to use both 12-hour and 24 formats, but would certainly use the 24-hour system when writing out important timings.
I grew up on the military 2135 style, though, not the strange 21:35 that computers now seem to display. I can happily read both without having to think, but am then completely thrown by something like “04:30 pm”. I feel that if it starts with a zero, we must be in the 24-hour system, and 04-anything is early in the morning!
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Post by Twoddle on May 27, 2020 21:30:24 GMT
Bloody Hell, Verbivore, how long do you spend putting your clocks forward and back an hour each Spring and Autumn?
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Post by Twoddle on May 27, 2020 21:35:31 GMT
It is strange that my son wrote to me only yesterday about this midday topic. Wikipedia has a lot to say about it at the end of this article: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/12-hour_clock. I go with the ISO. That Wikipedia page tallies with what I already thought: midnight is 12 a.m. and noon is 12 p.m. I didn't want to say so until I'd seen something authoritative!
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Post by Verbivore on May 27, 2020 22:38:15 GMT
Bloody Hell, Verbivore, how long do you spend putting your clocks forward and back an hour each Spring and Autumn? Only six, so not long: the analog wall clock, the wristwatch, the desk clock, the bedside piece, and the two car clocks. The rest change automatically through a universal signal (wirelessly or over the mains power).
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