Paraselene, peignoir, and the mysterious power of words

Paraselene, peignoir, and the mysterious power of words

There’s a webpage that lands in my e-mail every day. Maybe I signed up for it. I must have but I don’t remember. It’s called Word Thirst (wordthirst.com) and I love it, not only because it has nothing to do with all the bad things happening in the world, but also because some days it introduces me to words I don’t know, like paraselene, (Definition: a bright moonlike spot on a lunar halo; a mock moon). It also includes a graph, which shows when the word was most popular (in 1811, paraselene was very popular); and if it is popular still (it is not).

Read More

Our entire country has become a war zone

Our entire country has become a war zone

I cannot pronounce Luhansk and Lysychansk, because I have stopped watching television news. And because I no longer hear these names spoken, I don’t know how to say them.

I stopped watching the news every night because it is all calamity and conjecture interrupted by ads paid for by pharmaceutical companies, which would go bankrupt if, tomorrow morning, we all woke up well. And because the nightly news teaches me nothing I can’t learn by reading, I switched to print months ago.

Read More