Category: Today’s Word

Definition: (adjective) Relating to, situated in, or extending toward the middle; median. Synonyms: median. Usage: They took up defensive posts all along the field, with …

verb intr.: 1. To listen attentively. 2. Hark back: to allude to or return to a previous topic, time, event, etc.

Definition: (noun) A person who spreads frightening rumors and stirs up trouble. Synonyms: stirrer. Usage: When he started spreading the rumor that the government was …

Definition: (noun) A quiet plodding workhorse. Synonyms: farm horse. Usage: The dobbin had been a loyal and faithful worker, and the farmer was sad to …

Definition: (noun) A substance, such as calcium oxide or silica gel, that has a high affinity for water and is used as a drying agent. …

noun: An acute sense of taste.

Definition: (verb) To make uneasy or perplexed; disconcert. Synonyms: discompose, untune, upset, disconcert. Usage: Her extreme candor would often discomfit strangers who suddenly found themselves …

noun: 1. A book listing approved drugs and related information. 2. A stock of drugs.

Definition: (noun) The top stone of a structure or wall. Synonyms: stretcher, coping stone, copestone. Usage: When the structure's capstone was finally in place, the …

adjective: Fond of or living in inland bodies of water such as lakes, pools, etc.

Definition: (noun) One who works solely for compensation, especially a person willing to perform for a fee tasks considered menial or offensive. Synonyms: pensionary. Usage: …

verb tr.: To crunch, crush, or grind.

Definition: (adjective) Possible to impute or ascribe; attributable. Synonyms: ascribable, due to, referable. Usage: The oversight was not imputable to him because he was on …

noun: 1. A feeling of goodwill. 2. A state of good mental health.

Definition: (verb) To talk idly and at length; chatter. Synonyms: blabber, palaver, piffle, prattle. Usage: I know the age better than you do, though you …

Definition: (adjective) Enduring a very short time. Synonyms: ephemeral, fugacious, passing, short-lived, transitory. Usage: The elderly woman was depressed and spent her days lamenting the …

Definition: (noun) The food-conducting tissue of vascular plants, consisting of sieve tubes, fibers, parenchyma, and sclereids. Synonyms: bast. Usage: "Girdling" a tree, or cutting through …

noun: A style of painting in which small dots are applied to the canvas. Also known as pointillism.

Definition: (noun) One who shirks work or duty, especially one who tries to evade military service in wartime. Synonyms: shirker. Usage: My partner was a …

noun: A sacred poem or song. verb intr.: To sing a poem or song.

Definition: (adjective) Not capable of being persuaded by entreaty; relentless. Synonyms: relentless, grim, unappeasable, unrelenting, unforgiving, stern. Usage: The inexorable investigator questioned the witness repeatedly, …

noun: A sugar paste that’s molded into shapes and figures for decorating cakes, etc.

Definition: (noun) Miscellaneous items or written works collected together. Synonyms: assortment, mixed bag, motley, potpourri, salmagundi, smorgasbord, variety, mixture. Usage: The office was littered with …

noun: 1. An uneasy feeling about the rightness of a course of action. 2. A sudden feeling of sickness, faintness, or nausea.

Definition: (noun) Either of two small leather boxes, each containing strips of parchment inscribed with quotations from the Hebrew Scriptures, one of which is strapped …

noun: A general assembly of the people of a town, city, county, etc.

Definition: (noun) A tall upright megalith; found primarily in England and northern France. Synonyms: standing stone. Usage: The neo-pagans made the huge menhir the site …

Definition: (noun) A punctuation mark (/) used to separate related items of information. Synonyms: separatrix, solidus, slash, diagonal, stroke. Usage: Because the poem was reproduced …

Definition: (noun) One who is employed in the loading or unloading of ships. Synonyms: dock worker, dock-walloper, docker, dockhand, loader, longshoreman, lumper. Usage: As the …

noun: A person with a strong aversion to books.

Definition: (noun) A pipe of the bagpipe that is tuned to produce a single continuous tone. Synonyms: drone pipe. Usage: The continuous note emanating from …

noun: The material surrounding the main text of a book, such as covers, preface, bibliography, colophon, etc.

Definition: (noun) A peevish, irascible person; a grouch. Synonyms: crank, grouch, grump, churl. Usage: He was known to all as a crosspatch, but all that …

noun: A bookseller, especially of rare works.

Definition: (noun) A long angry or violent speech, usually of a censorious or denunciatory nature; a diatribe. Synonyms: philippic, broadside. Usage: Milady had listened to …

noun: A writer of prose.

Definition: (adjective) Being or taking a roundabout, lengthy course. Synonyms: roundabout. Usage: He prided himself on his sense of direction, so Jane refrained from mentioning …

noun: One who loves to read books; a bookworm.

Definition: (noun) A meal at midday; a luncheon. Synonyms: luncheon, dejeuner, lunch. Usage: His impudence still rankled when I came into the dining room at …

Definition: (noun) A prehistoric megalith typically having two upright stones and a capstone. Synonyms: cromlech. Usage: All that was left of the pre-historic community was …