Vocabulary Answers and the Sky

 
It was a really nice winter day today. There was a little bit of fresh snow on top of the packed stuff, and snowshoeing was fun!



I know you're just dying to know what those words mean, right? (I'm sure most of you don't care one little bit, but hey, I like new words, and it's my blog.)

1. agitprop
a. the turbulence near a propeller- just no, I made it up
b. political propoganda- a word compounded from agitation and propaganda, first used in Russia, to denote all sorts of writing and art forms with an explicitly political message.
c. a mine tunnel- an adit is a horizontal mine tunnel
d. stage dressing- properties or props, no agitation required

2. tessara
a. one unit of a mosaic- can be stone, metal, glass, tile, etc. The plural is tessarae
b. a type of lace- nope, another made up answer
c. a type of pottery- that's terra cotta
d. late summer- the name Theresa means late summer, from the Greek

3. diener
a. a unit of currency- that would be a dinar, a basic monetary unit in several Arabic countries
b. alternate spelling of diner- nah
c. a morgue worker- an autopsy technician, from the German leichendiener or corpse servant
d. a particular type of hardware like a nut- made up because of similarity to tool and die

4. bourse
a. a sac of fluid- that's bursa- in your shoulder or knee. Where you get bursitis
b. commonplace- you must be thinking of bourgeois
c. a type of stock exchange- yes, particularly in Europe
d. part of an insect's anatomy- just made up

5. shahtoosh
a. a type of jewelry- see b.
b. depiction of a royal name- that's a cartouche, particularly in hieroglyphics
c. a conquered king- you are thinking of "shah mat" the king is dead, the origin of the word checkmate in chess
d. a shawl made from the hair of Tibetan antelopes- yes, and the hair is so rare and difficult to spin that it's only made by certain monks, and is actually illegal to own

6. fry
a. fragile- you mean friable
b. a type of wetland- sounds like vly
c. a low vocal register- a way to produce lower sounds than in the normal vocal range by relaxing the vocal chords and allowing air to bubble through them
d. frumpish- no

Hope you had a little fun, at least wondering if some of the words were familiar.

The day also ended with a pretty sky. Nothing like the one two years ago.



Work tonight, and tomorrow... fun to come! Stay tuned.

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