David Zapatka Friend Marty Minnich and I were discussing the coronavirus pandemic when he closed his email with this statement, “I hope you and I will see each other fairly soon on the other side of all this tsuris.” Marty loves words so threw in tsuris at the end of his message. He’s a fellow verbivore.…
Tag: word of the month
Features, May 2020
Word of the Month: Obsequious & Sycophant
David Zapatka Friends and readers Randi and Jim Nulty write, “We enjoyed your April WOTM column. Randi once scored a triple word in Scrabble using the word ‘pismire.’ I think it was 70+points. We have never forgotten the word or its definition.” I suspect many of our readers are Scrabble players. I’ve always enjoyed that…
Features, April 2020
Word of the Month: Pismire
David Zapatka Reader Diane DeCarlo writes, “I enjoyed your article ‘Word’ in our January paper. I just wanted to share with you a favorite word of mine which is ‘pismere,’ another word for ‘ant.’ But I use the word for an annoying person.” Thank you for your suggestion Diane. I discovered you’re not the only…
Features, March 2020
Word of the Month: Existential Is Dictionary.com “Word of the Year”
David Zapatka From existential threats to existential choices, the word “existential” was used in the news and in conversations around the country frequently this past year. “I’m trash!” was the insistent cry of Forky, the googly-eyed spork whose struggle to be a toy was at the heart of the summer blockbuster Toy Story 4. Forky’s plight was entertaining,…
Features, September 2019
Word of the Month: Extirpate
David Zapatka While traveling this summer on the Goldwing, I chose to visit the granddaddy of all outdoor sporting goods stores, Bass Pro Shop, in Springfield, Missouri. If you’ve never been there, it’s spectacular and certainly worth a visit. Over 4,000,000 tourists visit this store every year, more than double the tourists to the famous…
Sports, June 2018
Word of the Month: Hoedown
David Zapatka Listening to classical music this morning as I do every morning and evening, I heard Aaron Copland’s familiar Hoe-Down classic. I’ve always thought a hoedown was a country-style social gathering with dance and music. Right on track, the upbeat and catchy Copland tune comes from his score to the ballet Rodeo, which…
Sports, August 2016
Word of the Month: Doyen
David Zapatka Friend and fellow table tennis-playing enthusiast, Bill Lewis, exposed me to our word for this month, doyen, in a recent correspondence about long-term expertise in the sport of table tennis. When reading his email and coming across his use of the word “doyen” I had to look this one up. Doyen noun doy·en doi-ĕn′,…