Word of the Day Challenge

[Sebile]

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Michelangelo, an Italian Renaissance artist, is nearly unequaled influentially—whether it's sculptures or paintings—on the evolution of Western art. His more substantive works include David and the breathtaking scenes from Genesis on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in Rome, both of which countless tourists venture to behold their splendor and draw creative inspiration from. Though the two pieces are certainly notable, he had produced others, even poetry. Pietà is one particular sculpture, completed when he was only twenty-four years old, that shows exquisite detail of the Virgin Mary grieving over the body of Jesus. It's mind-boggling how he took a simple block of stone and miraculously transformed it into smooth, life-like statues. tallied! -Brit

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[Nymphadora]

"It was our strength that kept our family safe, this key represents that now." She knew the story by heart and it often played out loudly in her dreams at night. "It secured the lock that held up as our name does. You've ruined that now!" Graham Kilpatrick was not a tall man but his strength was known amongst his children as he was not a man who spared the rod if it were required. The key Molly could see in her mind's eye, gargantuan and glinting in the light from her father's desk lamp as he waved it about dramatically. It was old, ancient, passed down through the Kilpatrick men along with its legend. The lock was long gone along with the original gate it held closed. Now it was a symbol only but one the elder Kilpatrick cherished dearly as part of his family's heritage in Ireland. "You don't have an ounce of brain in your head, girl. The shame you bring to our name . . ."

Molly woke up with a sob, as she always did from this dream. It was as if the massive voice was booming in the small half-empty apartment. Glancing at the clock she saw it was 5:30 in the morning. The sun would be up soon and there was no point to returning to sleep. Rolling out of bed, Molly headed for the kitchen to brew a pot of coffee.

[Lilias]

The History Museum was housed in a dainty pavilion of a neoclassical building, quite unlike the more imposing ones along the adjacent streets, at the back of an equally bijou square, complete with mounted bronze statue of some revolutionary general or other. The inside, however, held an intensity that Rose was totally unprepared for. All walls were painted gallery-red, against which the plaster cornices around the ceilings and windows gleamed perfectly white. The walls themselves were covered with paintings in heavy carved gilt frames, mostly portraits of the people who had fought and won the War of Independence, and then got the fledgling state to its figurative feet--formidable-looking men in white pleated skirts and embroidered waistcoats and ornate fezzes, with bristling moustaches and farouche expressions, and some in voluminous black cassocks or brocade vestments and wizard-grade beards. Underneath the paintings there was no end of glass cases holding what little they had left behind to be bequeathed to the state--weapons and letters and state documents with the scrawled signatures of those barely literate. Overwhelming didn’t even begin to describe it.

By contrast, the amphitheatrical room where the Parliament had met for over a century, where all those decisions immortalised in the displayed documents had been made, was light and airy, dust motes dancing in the sunlight slanting in through the high windows above the gallery. Rose smiled to herself, took a seat in one of the back rows, closed her eyes and concentrated. The message she was expecting would come through very soon.

tallied! -Brit

[Daeva]

Today's Word of the Day is....

cumulate
verb KYOO-myuh-laytv

Definition
1 : to gather or pile in a heap
2 : to combine into one
3 : to build up by addition of new material

Weekly Theme
Sci-Fi


Did You Know?
Cumulate and its far more common relative accumulate both come from the Latin word cumulare, meaning "to heap up." Cumulare, in turn, comes from cumulus, meaning "mass." (Cumulus functions as an English word in its own right as well. It can mean "heap" or "accumulation," or it can refer to a kind of dense puffy cloud with a flat base and rounded outlines.) Cumulate and accumulate overlap in meaning, but you're likely to find cumulate mostly in technical contexts. The word's related adjective, cumulative, however, is used more widely.

[Lilias]

Faith sat on the bench before the painting, sketchpad in her lap, not even pretending to work any longer. This was the most frustrating task Sophia had assigned her so far: study that sodding painting and find in it the key to unlock the next module they were going to work on. So far, in spite of spending the entire afternoon at the museum--which was currently half an hour from closing--Faith had drawn a total blank.

She had attempted to sketch it, so she could bring a copy home to study at her leisure, since photographing was not allowed… only to find out that, despite the hands-on involvement, she couldn’t concentrate on it. It had to be the original.

Faith sighed, rubbed her eyes and stood up to approach the hecking painting once more. It was nothing illustrious: a kraken--a gargantuan squid, or was it an octopus? she really couldn’t tell--ripping a galleon apart in a mass of writhing tentacles. It was obviously a reimagining of a medieval engraving, although the brushwork dated from the early nineteenth century. ‘F. Adolphus D., 1809’ was still visible in the bottom right corner. Google had turned up precisely nothing on the artist.

‘Fascinating, isn’t it?’ Faith jumped at the voice by her ear. The museum employee who had sneaked up on her, a woman only slightly older than herself, sporting the sleekest chignon Faith had ever seen and ‘NADIA’ on her name tag, stepped back with an apologetic smile. ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you. I’ve spent my share of time with that painting too. It’s maddening that we know nothing about the artist, isn’t it? At least, not from any official academic sources…’

Faith stared at her speechlessly for a moment, then the cogs in her mind jolted into frantic life. ‘Yes, yes it is. That’s why I think I’ll call it a day now,’ she said, reaching for her sketchpad with such haste that her pencils nearly rolled off the edge of the bench. She hurried out, too keen to get to the Chantry library to even say goodbye, and completely missed the little knowing smile on Nadia’s face.

tallied! -Brit

[Sebile]

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Day by tedious day, ᒍᑌᑎKᗷ0Ts carefully gathered the flotsam and jetsam left behind after the humans vacated Earth. All ᒍᑌᑎKᗷ0Ts were tasked solely to cumulate inorganic findings, a daunting duty with how much had amassed by their Earthling predecessors. Yet, they have roved and collected, compacting each load into small, palm-sized cubes. Landfills instantly metamorphosed into labyrinths comprised of cuboids, the ground below them clear of any debris. The approximate estimate of their completion is two hundred and fifty years, at the earliest, though what becomes of the blocks would be decided upon by those that inherit the desolate planet. A shame it inevitably came to this; however, the programmed bots continue doggedly, an apathetic workforce commissioned to do so. tallied! -Brit

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[Daeva]

Today's Word of the Day is....

imbroglio
noun im-BROHL-yoh

Definition
1 a : an acutely painful or embarrassing misunderstanding
b : a circumstance or action that offends propriety or established moral conceptions or disgraces those associated with it : scandal
c : a violently confused or bitterly complicated altercation : embroilment
d : an intricate or complicated situation (as in a drama or novel)
2 : a confused mass

Weekly Theme
Sci-Fi


Did You Know?
Imbroglio and embroilment are more than just synonyms; they're also linked through etymology. Both descend from the Middle French verb embrouiller (which has the same meaning as embroil), from the prefix em-, meaning "thoroughly," plus brouiller, meaning "to mix" or "to confuse." (Brouiller is itself a descendant of an Old French word for "broth.") Early in the 17th century, English speakers began using embroil, a direct adaptation of embrouiller, as well as the noun embroilment. Meanwhile, the Italians were using their own alteration of embrouiller: imbrogliare, meaning "to entangle." In the mid-18th century, English speakers embraced the Italian noun imbroglio as well.

[Sebile]

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In a blink, it transpired. THWACK! The cue ball coasts from one side of the elegant table in a diminutive puff of powder.  Jen instantly stands, her shoulders relaxing. The butt of the pool cue rests upon the ground beside her. Tattooed fingers clench its glossy neck, leisurely constricting into a vexed fist as the ball hits its intended target but not angled accurately. It's a bust. "It jus' ain't my day," she says, pilfering the pack of Marlboro cigarettes from the table. "So what will it be this time, Frank? I heard about that imbroglio in the district last night; you know who started it." Promptly seated, digits shackled with gold rings, the man smiles at her. He steeples his fingers, introspection draining his visage of pleasure. With an exasperated sigh, he answers: "Aye, ol Johnny B. That boyo started makin' waves, bein' narky. He’s bent as a nine-bob note." Frank takes a drink, though sets the refreshment once more in a female's hand, one presently perched on the armrest to his seat. "Give 'em a good pastin' and tell 'em if he ain't pay in the fortnight, with interest, you's ganna take it outta 'em. In for a penny, in for a pound..." A palm lands on the waitresses thigh, jolting it with a light slap. "It'll be my pleasure." The redhead nods, eagerly accepting her necessary task. She plucks a fag from the pack and launches the crinkled case back onto the table. It looked like tonight would be a lengthy one. Without another word, she makes a beeline for the door. tallied! -Brit

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[Daeva]

Today's Word of the Day is....

adjudicate
verb uh-JOO-dih-kayt

Definition

1 : to make an official decision about who is right in (a dispute) : to settle judicially
2 : to act as judge

Weekly Theme
Sci-Fi


Did You Know?
Adjudicate is one of several terms that give testimony to the influence of jus, the Latin word for "law," on our legal language. Adjudicate is from the Latin verb adjudicare, from judicare, meaning "to judge," which, in turn, traces to the Latin noun judex, meaning "judge." English has other judex words, such as judgment, judicial, judiciary, and prejudice. If we admit further evidence, we discover that the root of judex is jus. What's the verdict? Latin "law" words frequently preside in English-speaking courtrooms. In addition to the judex words, jury, justice, injury, and perjury are all ultimately from Latin jus.

[The Green One]

Someone sits above them all. Atop the tallest tower, the most powerful tower, the brightest tower. Glass and iron and lives and money all invested in showing off how little the owner thinks of themselves, that they had the need of building such a delicate monstrosity. Small and tired eyes watch as natural and synthetic forms of life cumulate in an imbroglio and fight to survive in the artificial city.



tallied! -Brit

[Daeva]

Today's Word of the Day is....

myopic
adjective mye-OH-pik

Definition

1 : affected by myopia : of, relating to, or exhibiting myopia : nearsighted
2 : lacking in foresight or discernment : narrow in perspective and without concern for broader implications

Weekly Theme
Sci-Fi


Did You Know?
Myopia is a condition in which visual images come to a focus in front of the retina of the eye, resulting in defective vision of distant objects. Those with myopia can be referred to as "myopic" (or, less formally, "nearsighted"). Myopic has extended meanings, too. Someone myopic might have trouble seeing things from a different perspective or considering the future consequences before acting. Myopic and myopia have a lesser-known relative, myope, meaning "a myopic person." All of these words ultimately derive from the Greek myōps, which comes from myein (meaning "to be closed") and ōps (meaning "eye, face").

[Daeva]

Today's Word of the Day is....

doldrums
plural noun DOHL-drumz

Definition

1 : a spell of listlessness or despondency
2 often capitalized Doldrums : a part of the ocean near the equator abounding in calms, squalls, and light shifting winds
3 : a state or period of inactivity, stagnation, or slump


Weekly Theme
Sci-Fi


Did You Know?
Almost everyone gets the doldrums—a feeling of low spirits and lack of energy—every once in a while. The doldrums experienced by sailors, however, are usually of a different variety. In the early-19th century, the word once reserved for a feeling of despondency came to be applied to certain tropical regions of the ocean marked by the absence of strong winds. Sailing vessels, reliant on wind propulsion, struggled to make headway in these regions, leading to long, arduous journeys. The exact etymology of doldrums is not certain, though it is believed to be related to the Old English dol, meaning "foolish"—a history it shares with our adjective dull.

[wordpecker]

It was a myopic decision on the government's part to stop funding for the project. Sure, it had been two years behind schedule and more than 150% over budget with about two-thirds of it still pending, but halting the project now was a waste of all the resources spent so far. It wasn't about a few years of budget deficits, it was about creating the right foundation for humanity to build upon, over decades to come. It could have been the first step of an outward journey spanning not just the solar system, but deeper into the Milky Way and perhaps out of it into the wider universe. But the decision was made, and Moon Base would lie incomplete and in doldrums for a good part of a decade. It was only when Salvador Hardin became President that things took a brighter turn.

[Sebile]

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Hydros was a city constructed upon diversification, it joyfully celebrated differences and for decades crime was in the doldrums. Universal regulations were agreed at length by the Council, nearly all concurred that they adjudicated fairly; however, some thought otherwise. Fearmongering and political chicanery became a faction's weapon of choice; the Leogere found recruits easily as societal rifts merged and clashed. It sparked one of the most large-scale wars that Hydros had seen, regrettably a quarter of the population dead in the chaos and the Leogere lost. Fifty years would pass before the discordant citizenry was brought together again. The lessons of the past ought to be retained, or history was doomed to repeat itself. The Council knew this. From that day forward, every individual was educated in hopes they learned from previous mistakes and each bore the guilt. tallied! -Brit

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[Lilias]

When Ian finally made it home - if the tiny, bare studio on the 23rd floor of the employee quarters could be called that - Christina had fallen asleep on the sofa, with her ancient, battered copy of The Lady and the Unicorn resting on her bump. Still, she opened her eyes at the sound of the door closing, quiet as he tried to make it. ‘I’m not going to state the obvious,’ she said.

‘I know. I’m sorry. Meeting after regular hours. How are you feeling? Up for some supper?’

Christina sat up slowly and the book slid to the floor. ‘There’s soup and meatballs in the chiller, but I’m not sure how much would stay down if I tried…’

‘We’ll have to get you some proper treatment, then.’ Keeping his tone and his face neutral was going to be a challenge.

She snorted. ‘Have you planted a money tree, by any chance? Or has Facto gone bust?’ Her bitterness was understandable. Ever since Facto had achieved monopoly over pharmaceuticals, the price hikes had made it so that only the very well-off (coincidentally, a lot of them seemed to be Facto staff) had the wherewithal to get all their healthcare needs covered. A pregnant woman too sick to work was never going to afford even the necessary drugs, let alone a hospital stay.

‘No and no, but neither will be a problem where we’re going.’

She looked confused. ‘Where…?’

‘Aria Prime. New branch starting, and I’m to oversee. Well, an outpost right now, but it will grow. That’s what the meeting was about.’ Ian was grinning openly now. ‘Did I mention the job comes with a substantive pay rise as well? Although it won’t matter that much--Facto has no pull in the Aria system. There’s even a bed aboard the medical frigate in orbit with your name on it, if you end up needing it.’

Christina’s eyes were welling with tears. Ian folded her in his arms lightly, without sidestepping her bump. ‘Cheer up, darling. You’re going to be fine--all three of you.’

tallied! -Brit

[Britwitch]

Today's Word of the Day is....

foray
noun FOR-ay

Definition

1 : a sudden or irregular invasion or attack for war or spoils : raid

2 : an initial and often tentative attempt to do something in a new or different field or area of activity


Weekly Theme
Historical


Did You Know?
Foray comes from Middle English forrayen and probably traces back to an Anglo-French word that meant "raider" or "forager." It's related to the word forage, which commonly means "to wander in search of food (or forage)." Foray, in its earliest sense, referred to a raid for plunder. Relatively recently, foray began to take on a broader meaning. In a sense, foray still refers to a trip into a foreign territory. These days, though, looting and plundering needn't be involved in a foray. When you take a foray, you dabble in an area, occupation, or pastime that's new to you.

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The west wind carried rumors of another foray.  By the waning autumn moon, the reivers were out again, 100 mounted lances.  All along the Border, in isolated villages, in lonely farms, in the manors, doors were bolted and barred.  For the unlucky on both sides of the line, villages burned, cattle were run off, men taken hostage or cruelly murdered. The Warden's men were in distant pursuit.

In one of these villages along the line of the reivers' retreat, an upper story window opened briefly and closed, a figure hurried through empty the lane. Behind the bolted and barred doors, the men and women clutched farm tools, weapons or just waited.

[Lilias]

‘Madame Vera and I have conferred on the need for suitable consequences for yesterday’s imbroglio,’ started Sophia, ‘with a view of creating a teaching experience, rather than a mere punishment.’

‘Imbroglio’ was a rather extreme term for the incident, but that was Sophia’s style. There had just been a bit of an altercation between Faith and Anna in the Chantry library, which escalated into a bit of a tussle, which resulted in two books needing new bindings and an urn of Tass getting broken. All right, there was only a little of it left at the bottom, but… okay, perhaps Sophia did have a point.

‘You two are expected to appear at the certámen circle on Monday at noon and display your skill up to neutralising point. There will be no draining--I cannot stress that enough. Madame Vera and I will witness, and a third party will adjudicate. I suggest you start preparing immediately. You don’t have much time. Dismissed.’

Outside in the corridor, Faith shook her head in disbelief. ‘They’re throwing us into a magical duel over that?’

Anna rolled her eyes. ‘You lot are such a bunch of drama queens. Madame Vera would have probably put us into a vision quest. It would scramble our minds six ways to Sunday, but we’d be in bed the whole while.’

Faith mustered her most impressive side-eye. ‘Do you even know how certámen works?’

Anna looked decidedly unimpressed by the effort. ‘Do you think Madame Vera would have gone with it if I didn’t?’

‘Fair point,’ conceded Faith. ‘Who do you think is going to be the adjudicator?’

‘No idea.’ Anna nudged her with her shoulder, starting along the corridor again. ‘But we really don’t have much time. Let’s go practise. Just pretend it’s chess and I’ll be checkmating you in under ten moves.’

‘Dream on.’

tallied! -Brit

[Remec]

Title: An Absence of Starlight
Days: 1/21-1/26
Theme: Scifi


Anderson walked onto the bridge and glanced about at the faces of the “night” shift. It was clear things hadn’t changed yet, and were unlikely to anytime soon. He sighed and several people turned to regard him. He could feel all their eyes as each additional gaze began to cumulate and add to the feeling that their misfortune was almost entirely due to his starting such a substantive imbroglio at the last starport.

How was I to know you don’t touch that species in that place?

And, granted, it was totally myopic of him to set off for the mining belt without awaiting the arrival of an official from the Empire coming to adjudicate their next step. Hopefully the solar sail would reenergize the ship’s power stores before they drifted into worse trouble.

Who knew they would get stuck behind a gas giant with what had to be the slowest orbit I'd ever heard of? Or that even starships suffered from the doldrums when power gauges fell below a certain point?

tallied! -Brit

[Britwitch]

Today's Word of the Day is....

sleuth
verb SLOOTH

Definition
1 : to act as a detective : search for information

2 : to search for and discover


Weekly Theme
Historical


Did You Know?
"They were the footprints of a gigantic hound!" Those canine tracks in Arthur Conan Doyle's The Hound of the Baskervilles set the great Sherlock Holmes sleuthing on the trail of a murderer. It was a case of art imitating etymology. When Middle English speakers first borrowed sleuth from Old Norse, the term referred to "the track of an animal or person." In Scotland, sleuthhound referred to a bloodhound used to hunt game or track down fugitives from justice. In 19th-century U.S. English, sleuthhound became an epithet for a detective and was soon shortened to sleuth. From there, it was only a short leap to turning sleuth into a verb describing what a sleuth does

[Britwitch]

Today's Word of the Day is....

charisma
noun kuh-RIZ-muh

Definition
1 : a personal magic of leadership arousing special popular loyalty or enthusiasm for a public figure (such as a political leader)

2 : a special magnetic charm or appeal

Weekly Theme
Historical


Did You Know?
The Greek word charisma means "favor" or "gift." It is derived from the verb charizesthai ("to favor"), which in turn comes from the noun charis, meaning "grace." In English, charisma has been used in Christian contexts since the mid-1500s to refer to a gift or power bestowed upon an individual by the Holy Spirit for the good of the Church, a sense that is now very rare. The earliest nonreligious use of charisma that we know of occurred in a German text, a 1922 publication by sociologist Max Weber. The sense began appearing in English contexts shortly after Weber's work was published.

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Although affable in public, as a band leader in rehearsal he had the charisma of an angry badger on a foray against a bee hive.  Improvising a note beyond the chart would bring down blistering rebukes of original invective that went on and on until those of us in the sound booth couldn't keep from smirking, then laughing out loud.

[Sebile]

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Dark and clammy, the perilous ambience of the alleyway clung to old pleasures; working class locality attempt to inveigle him from urgent business. All offers were politely declined and they eventually carried on as usual, prattling about rent— completely unruffled by the bright juxtaposition of red rivers through the muck and murk. The sleuth pursued the clue, trailing not far behind the culprit responsible for the new wave of heinous crimes. Each atrocity only added to an otherwise large death toll and the police were stumped. Their investigation had stalled out with no new leads in weeks. Perhaps that's why they asked him to the case, and he was certainly happy to oblige in offering a new perspective; anything to help. tallied! -Brit

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[Lilias]

The excitement in the concert hall was almost palpable. The three musicians on stage had finished tuning up; all that remained was for the last two of the group to arrive and the performance to begin.

Sarah shifted in her seat; Lord Bowers’ box, though modest, was a lot roomier and more comfortable than the circle seats, but she couldn’t shake a sense of unease that had been growing the longer she spent in the hall, and had little, by now, to do with having to pretend to be his lordship’s date for the evening.

This was work, she reminded herself, and work dealt with a lot of things that, in an orderly world, could not or should not exist. Owen Glyndwr, tonight’s target, was a child prodigy pianist and newfangled composer. His virtuosity was unquestioned, but he was notoriously difficult to work with and had found it hard to adapt to the professional circuit as an adult. His career had languished in the doldrums for nearly two decades, towards the end of which he had grown increasingly reclusive. Then, out of nowhere, he had emerged from his isolation, formed the Ynis Witrin Ensemble (Gavin Kincaid, violin; Terrance Walsh, cello; Fenella Sweeney, harp; Aine Llewellyn, vocals) and started performing his own works--mostly arrangements of folk songs, some very obscure--to increasingly spellbound audiences. Their reputation spread like wildfire, bringing them from country pubs in the Black Hills to posh concert halls like this one in less than a year. One could have argued that they simply captured the zeitgeist of a disillusioned world rediscovering the wonder of myth. That might have been all there was to it, if the Arcanum had not collected too many accounts of unexplained mental and physical collapses in the wake of the Ensemble’s performances to be accidental.

A roar of applause jolted Sarah out of her thoughts--Glyndwr had taken to the stage with Aine Llewellyn on his arm. There was no lectern for her, but he guided her to the front of the stage, where a slightly blue spotlight brought out her white gown and long golden curls, and took his place at the gleaming black Steinway. With his skinny slouched frame and wild shock of red hair, he looked like a scarecrow; an elegant one, in his tuxedo, but a scarecrow nonetheless.

Silence stretched for a few moments, then Sweeney struck a long chord on her harp, that made the hairs on Sarah’s arms spring up. She was not alone; there was a collective intake of breath from the audience, and while the resonance still hung in the air, the piano came on.

It was all a blur after that. Sarah remembered that the cello and violin played in perfect counterpoint, and that the piano’s tone was a lot brighter than one would expect, even from the high notes, and that Llewellyn’s voice, the purest soprano she had ever heard, weaved the words--There lived a lady by the North Sea shore / Lay the bent to the bonnie broom / Two daughters were the babes she bore--with a sweetness that should have been entirely wrong for the tragic ballad of the Cruel Sister… and yet wasn’t.

She was pulled back to reality by Lord Bowers leaning in to whisper in her ear: ‘You understand now why this is worrisome.’

Sarah nodded, digging her nails into her palms to ward off the last effects of the charm. They would likely have to leave long before the end of the performance. There was something at work here, something decidedly not human, and major sleuthing was in order.

tallied! -Brit

[Pacer]

The imbroglio at the dog park started when a standard poodle owned by the Secretary of State for War took down the Ambassador's pit bull - the dispute apparently involving possession of a red and blue rubber ball.  Police were summoned, then Special Branch sleuths.  Cats were said to be involved.  The Opposition made official inquiries to the Government and the Attorney General found substantive cause to prosecute.  Nevertheless, both countries partially mobilized naval reserves and stood at the brink of war until the poodle admitted guilt and pleaded to a lesser charge.  With the matter adjudicated, and with all involved somewhat embarrassed by the events, the matter was quietly forgotten by everyone.