Word of the day

Tribology (noun)

1. (physics, engineering) The science and technology of friction, lubrication, and wear.

Logarithmancy (noun)

1. Divination using logarithms.

across the pond (prepositional phrase)

1. On or to the other side of the Atlantic Ocean.

Linkrot (noun)

1. The steady increase in the number of broken hyperlinks as webpages are moved or removed.

Kinesics (noun)

1. The study of non-verbal communication by means of gestures and/or other body movements.
2. Such non-verbal communication.

Communalect (noun)

1. The lect (linguistic variety) spoken by a particular speech community.

antediluvian (adj)

1. Belonging or pertaining to, or existing in, the time prior to the great flood described in Genesis, or (by extension) to a great or destructive flood or deluge described in other mythologies.
2. Of animals and plants: long extinct; prehistoric.
3. Of a person or thing: very old; ancient.
4. Of attitudes, ideas, etc.: extremely old-fashioned, especially to a laughable extent; antiquated.

Antediluvian (noun)

1. A person who lived in the time prior to the great flood described in Genesis, especially one of the biblical patriarchs.
2. A very old person.
3. A person with extremely old-fashioned attitudes, ideas, etc., especially to a laughable extent; a fogey or old fogey.

Finial (noun)

1. Especially in Gothic architecture: an ornament, often in the form of a bunch or knot of foliage, on the peak of the gable of a roof, a pediment, a pinnacle, etc.
2. Any decorative fitting on the corner, end, or top of an object such as a canopy, a fencepost, a flagpole, or the newel post of a staircase.
3. The completion or end of something.

Auslaut (noun)

1. Synonym of coda (“the optional final sound of a syllable or word, occurring after its nucleus and usually composed of one or more consonants”).

Hacker (noun)

1. Someone who hacks.
2. One who cuts with heavy or rough blows.
3. One who is inexperienced or unskilled at a particular activity, especially (sports, originally and chiefly golf), a sport such as golf or tennis.
4. One who uses a computer to gain unauthorized access to data stored in, or to carry out malicious attacks on, computer networks or computer systems.
5. Synonym of white hat. A computer security professional who hacks computers for a good cause, or to aid a company, organization, or government without causing harm (for example, to identify security flaws).
6. Someone who cheats or gains an unfair advantage in a video game by means of a disallowed modification to the game.
7. One who is expert at programming and solving problems with a computer.
8. One who applies a novel method, shortcut, skill, or trick to something to increase ease, efficiency, or productivity.
9. Synonym of hackster (“a violent bully or ruffian; also, an assassin, a murderer”)
10. Something that hacks; a device or tool for hacking; specifically, an axe used for cutting tree branches or wood.
11. A fork-shaped tool used to harvest root vegetables

Maven (noun)

1. An expert in a given field; also, a person who is interested in and knowledgeable about a particular activity or thing; an aficionado.

Preterimperfect (noun)

1. The imperfect tense.

preterimperfect (adj)

1. Imperfect.

multipart (adj)

1. Having multiple parts
2. Of computer printout that is printed in multiple copies on paper having two or four continuous sheets rolled together with interleaving carbon paper; after printing it is separated on a decollator.

panglossian (adj)

1. Naively or unreasonably optimistic.
2. Of or relating to the view that this is the best of all possible worlds.

Quintessence (noun)

1. A thing that is the most perfect example of its type; the most perfect embodiment of something; epitome, prototype.
2. A pure substance.
3. The essence of a thing in its purest and most concentrated form.
4. The fifth alchemical element, or essence, after earth, air, fire, and water that fills the universe beyond the terrestrial sphere.
5. A hypothetical form of dark energy postulated to explain observations of an accelerating universe.

quintessence (verb)

1. To reduce to its purest and most concentrated essence.

dividual (adj)

1. Separate; distinct.

Chiromancer (noun)

1. One who practices chiromancy; a palm reader.

Sanguinaria (noun)

1. (botany) Any of the genus Sanguinaria, or bloodroots.
2. The rootstock of the bloodroot, used in medicine as an emetic, etc.

sanguinaria (adj ~ Italian)

1. feminine singular of sanguinario.

Covey (noun)

1. A brood or family of partridges (family Phasianidae), which includes game birds such as grouse (tribe Tetraonini) and ptarmigans (tribe Tetraonini, genus Lagopus).
2. A group of other birds, such as quail (superfamily Phasianoidea).
3. A group or party of people; also, a group or set of things.

covey (verb)

1. To gather into a group.

Annulus (noun)

1. A ring- or donut-shaped area or structure.
2. A ring of fibrous tissue; specifically (cardiology), such a ring around an opening of a heart valve, to which the valve leaflets and muscle fibres of the atria and ventricles are attached; an annulus fibrosus cordis.
3. A ring of light in a celestial body, especially when caused by an annular eclipse (for example, when the Sun and Moon are in line with the Earth, but the Moon does not completely cover the Sun's disc).
4. A structure surrounding a sporangium (or part of it) which shrinks and causes it to rupture for spore dispersal; specifically, in a fern: a structure around about two-thirds of the sporangium consisting of differentially thick-walled cells which dry and distort the sporangium; and in a moss: a complete ring of cells around the tip of the sporangium which dissolves to cause the tip to detach.
5. The membranous remnants of a partial veil which leaves a ring on the stem of a mushroom.
6. The region in a plane between two concentric circles of different radii.
7. Any topological space homeomorphic to the region in a plane between two concentric circles of different radii.
8. In a well such as an oil well or water well: the space between a pipe or tube and any pipe, tube, casing, or sides of a hole surrounding it.

Dictionaryese (noun)

1. The style of language used in dictionary definitions, characterized by dry, straightforward, and occasionally awkward phrasing.

emboss (verb)

1. To cause (something) to stick out or swell; to extrude; also, to cause (someone or something) to be covered in swellings.
2. To make (a design on a coin, an ornament on an object, etc.) stand out from a surface.
3. To represent (a subject) on an object in relief; also, of a design or subject: to stand out on (an object) in relief.
4. To decorate or mark (something) with a design or symbol in relief.
5. To decorate (something) with bosses (“ornamental convex protuberances”); to boss; hence, to decorate (something) richly.
6. To cause (something) to be prominent or stand out.
7. To make (speech, etc.) unduly bombastic or grand.

Emboss (noun)

1. Synonym of boss (“a knob or projection”).

stanch (verb)

1. To stop the flow of (water or some other liquid).
2. To stop the flow of (blood); also, to stop (a wound) from bleeding.
3. To make (a building or other structure) watertight or weatherproof.
4. To check or stop, or deter (an action).
5. To stop the progression of (an illness); also, to alleviate (pain); often followed by of: to relieve (someone's) pain.
6. To extinguish or put out (a fire, anger, etc.); also, to quench or satisfy (desire, hunger, thirst, etc.).
7. Of bleeding: to stop.
8. Of an occurrence or other thing: to come to an end; to cease; also, of persons: to stop acting violently.

Stanch (noun)

1. A floodgate by which water is accumulated, for floating a boat over a shallow part of a stream by its release; also, a dam or lock in a river.

millennial (adj)

1. Thousand-year-old; also (by extension, loosely) thousands of years old.
2. Occurring every thousand years.
3. Occurring at, or relating to, the beginning or end of a millennium.
4. Referring to the thousandth anniversary of an event or happening.
5. Often capitalized: of or relating to, or characteristic of, people born in the last two decades of the 20th century from around the early 1980s to the mid 1990s, and who reached adulthood early in the third millennium C.E.
6. Synonym of millenarian “pertaining to the belief in an impending period of one thousand years of peace and righteousness associated with the Second Coming of Christ and his reign on earth”.

Millennial (noun)

1. Often capitalized: a person from the generation born in the last two decades of the 20th century, from around the early 1980s to the mid-1990s and who reached adulthood early in the third millennium C.E., characterized by their familiarity with computer technology and poorer financial prospects than their parents.
2. A thousandth anniversary; also, a celebration of such an anniversary.

Megalith (noun)

1. A large stone slab making up a prehistoric monument, or part of such a monument.
2. A prehistoric monument made up of one or more large stones.
3. A large stone or block of stone used in the construction of a modern structure.

drench (verb)

1. To cause (someone) to drink; to provide (someone) with a drink
2. To administer a dose or draught of liquid medicine to (an animal), often by force.
3. To make (someone or something) completely wet by having water or some other liquid fall or thrown on them or it; to saturate, to soak; also (archaic), to make (someone or something) completely wet by immersing in water or some other liquid; to soak, to steep.
4. To drown (someone).
5. To overwhelm (someone); to drown, to engulf.
6. To be drowned; also, to be immersed in water.

Drench (noun)

1. An act of making someone or something completely wet; a soak or soaking, a wetting.
2. An amount of water or some other liquid that will make someone or something completely wet.
3. The name Drench has been used for multiple Transformers characters.
   1993 — Drench the Decepticon Stormtrooper sportscar from the transitional period between Generation 1 and Generation 2.
   1993 — Drench the Autobot Color Changer LeMans racer from Generation 2.
   2004 — Drench the unreleased Decepticon sportscar from the Unicron Trilogy via Universe.
   2008 — Drench the evil Autobot Seeker commander from Shattered Glass.