GAME: Word of the Day (WOTD)

[E Pericoloso Sporgersi]

Gasconade

\gas-kuh-NAYD\ noun

: bravado or exaggerated boasting

Example Sentence:
"Honesty and frankness do more for the public's confidence … than extravagant boasting or supercilious gasconade." (F. Gonzalez-Crussi, The New York Times, April 7, 2002)

Did you know?
The citizens of Gascony in southwestern France have proverbially been regarded as prone to bragging. Their reputation has been immortalized in such swashbuckling literary works as Alexandre Dumas' The Three Musketeers (d'Artagnan) and Edmond Rostand's Cyrano de Bergerac. Linguistically, the legend survives in the word "gascon," meaning "braggart," as well as in "gasconade" itself.

Gascony is to Europe what Texas is to the USA.

[Algot Runeman]

According to the lean E.Pericoloso Sporgersi:

Gascony is to Europe what Texas is to the USA.

Waal, shucks, Pilgrim. Y'all certainly got that one right, although them %*&@ Yurowpeeuns, no matter whar they come from will nevah, evah draw nigh the absolute ascendency of us Texans. Our Lemonade is better than their Gasconade. We are great no matter how our manners grate!

Attempt to translate into more standard American English:
[Well, shucks innocent wanderer. You certainly stated your case well, although those %*&@ Europeans, no matter their region of origin, will never, ever approach the absolute dominance of us Texans. We are fantastic, no matter how our boasts bother others!]

Did you notice that some words were the same?
%*&@

Algot Runeman officially born long ago, just 12 miles from the Mexican border (north side of it...Some say I'm alien (strange), but I'm legal!)

[E Pericoloso Sporgersi]

... Algot Runeman officially born long ago, just 12 miles from the Mexican border (north side of it...Some say I'm alien (strange), but I'm legal!)

C'mon, admit it, the "Men in Black", while UTI (or maybe not), erroneously took you from just the south of the border to just north of it.

[Darb]

BP "Gasconade" Colada (recipe)
Palmful of Methane Hydrate "Ice", chunked
12 fl oz Gasoline, 93 octane, unleaded, well chilled
4 fl oz White Rum
1 oz Lime Juice
1 frozen ripe Bananna
4 fl oz Cream of Coconut

Directions:
* Don protective flame retardant clothing.
* Combine all ingredients in blender in a flame-safe area.
* Frappe until smooth and thick.
* Pour into a large poco grande glass, and insert straw
* Toss in a lit match.
* Apply containment dome.
* Do NOT consume (highly poisonous and flammable)

[E Pericoloso Sporgersi]

Had d'Artagnan met my grandma, he would have tried to court her, but to no avail. All his boisterous gasconades would have slid off her furs like a drop of water off a Gascon goose.

Spoiler: show

P.S. Have you noticed that gasconade contains the word gas?

[E Pericoloso Sporgersi]

haptic

\HAP-tik\
adjective:
Relating to the sense of touch; tactile.

noun:
The science that deals with the sense of touch.

Quotes:

Why do people want haptic augmented reality? So a mother-to-be can touch her unborn child in the womb.
-- Bruce Sterling, "Beyond the beyond: Augmented Reality: Haptic Augmented Reality", Wired, May 2010

Loats would hear her get up at night, making her haptic way through the dark rooms, peering through the windows into the night for the telltale lanterns of the Americans.
-- Annie Proulx, Accordion Crimes

Origin:
Haptic derives from the Greek haptikos, "to grasp."

[E Pericoloso Sporgersi]

My grandma adored the haptic sensations provided by her fur garments.
But my grandpa liked the feel of what was underneath.

[Darb]

I'm extremely haptic by nature. However, if I suddenly lost both arms, legs, liver, and half my brain, I'd be unhappily hapless, hepatic AND helpless to boot, right ?

Help me Rhonda, help help me Rhonda ...

[Algot Runeman]

Hoot! Well done, Darb. Haptic honors happily hand-heaped here.

E.P.S. Thanks for the words.

I've been out of touch with WotD lately. I've had a touch of something. It is touching that someone is on the ball. Footballers get a lot of touches during the World Cup tournament (see, even Texan-Americans can use the term accurately). I do remain a big fan of the NPOBL*, formerly NFL.

* National Pointy Oval Ball League

[E Pericoloso Sporgersi]

E.P.S. Thanks for the words.

No need to thank me.
It was a happy happenstance that I happened to happen on to the http://dictionary.reference.com/wordoftheday?jss=0 site where I was researching a word suspected of haplography. But it proved to be no typo, but a correct haplology.

[E Pericoloso Sporgersi]

yaw

\YAW\ , verb;
1.
To move unsteadily; weave.
2.
To deviate temporarily from a straight course, as a ship.
3.
(Of a vehicle) to have a motion about the vertical axis.

Quotes:
Test pilot Joseph A. Walker flew the X-15 an estimated 28 miles high Thursday, testing a new way to curb the rocket plane's tendency to yaw as it plunges back from the edge of space.
-- "X-15 Flight Tests Tighter Yaw Control", Milwaukee Journal, 1962

Now to this hand, now to that, he yawed in his faltering flight, and still at every billow that he broke, he spasmodically sank in the sea, or sideways rolled towards the sky his one beating fin.
-- Herman Melville, Moby Dick, or The Whale

Origin:
Yaw migrates to English from the Old Norse jaga, "to drive, chase."

[Algot Runeman]

It's morning here and I am still yawning. As I carry my coffee across to the table, I fight the tendency to yaw. As a sailor wannabe, I try to tack gently across the room. The shakiness of my hand will pass, but probably only after the coffee reaches my stomach and suffuses to my extremities.

[Darb]

Is it possible to Yaw to Port while listing to Starboard, and not fall over ?

I certainly cannot.

Grammar question for Laurie: are relative nautical directions like port and starboard supposed to be capitalized in the same way as compass directions ? I forget.

[Algot Runeman]

Darb,

You'll yaw whenever you drink port, no matter which side of the boat you are on.

[E Pericoloso Sporgersi]

When my grandma strolled down a street, dressed in one of her fur coats, all male pedestrians and automobile drivers tended to yaw from their intended course, bump into streetlamps, vending machines, hawkers' stands and mostly collide with each other.
The police chief, one of the hapless victims, tried to curb street traffic when my grandma was afoot, but his attempt failed miserably and he soon yawed back to the usual chaotic traffic rules.

My grandpa, having observed this phenomenon, tended to say "Yaw" when he actually meant "Yeah".

P.S. In Antwerpian slang the very positive "Ja" (= Yes) is pronounced exactly like "Yaw". Hence my grandpa saying "Yaw" instead of "Yeah".

[E Pericoloso Sporgersi]

... are relative nautical directions like port and starboard supposed to be capitalized in the same way as compass directions ? I forget.

Would 'Poopwards' be in the direction of the 'Head'?

[Darb]

Not if the ship has a cabin-forwards design.

[E Pericoloso Sporgersi]

oscitant

\OS-i-tuhnt\ , adjective;
1.
Yawning, as with drowsiness; gaping.
2.
Drowsy or inattentive.
3.
Dull, lazy, or negligent.

Quotes:
The sauntering, supine, and oscitant gentleman, by his birth and great possessions, exempt from labor and exercise, therefore is entitled to diseases.
-- Anonymous, Gentleman's magazine and monthly American review, Volume 5

In the suite, I asked Miss Stone what was the worst question that reporters would ask her. She gave me an oscitant gaze and said, "They ask me how I got my break."
-- Chris Curtis, The Turning Point

Origin:
Oscitant derives from the Latin oscitare, "to gape or yawn."

Edit: added title banner

[Algot Runeman]

Morning again, coffee at my side. Open my email and the WotD notice jumps out of my LCD screen. Eager fingers click the embedded link and launch my browser. There it is, a new exciting opportunity to engage my brain with the wide richness of the English language.

But, wait. Excitement exits efficiently. Instead, my breathing slows; I sigh; eventually I yawn. The screen goes out of focus and my lower lip sags as interest fades.

Oh, hold on; refill my cup! Wake! Arise! Obviate oscitant observation of lexical obscurity with a jolt of java. Go ahead and write a witty (witless?) post to get your lazy brain focused on the wonderful word of the day. You'll feel better about yourself.

[Darb]

Meanwhile, on the other side of the virtual breakfast breakfast table, Darb was fast aleep, face down in his bowl of steel-cut oatmeal porridge, sleeping off a long night's effort to vanquish the remains of a cask of Guinness.

In his mind's eye, he was fighting a pitched battle against hordes of ravaging Osciants from the Land of Nod. His war-chariot, the Nostromo, was being drawn by a wildly racing team of black Nighmares, with hooves and eyes of flame. In his left hand he held a long fire-hardened spear whose tip was slathered with a toxic extract of zolpidem.

Suddenly, an enormous osciant chieftain lept onto the side of the chariot, and roared an enormous yawn. Darb's spear thrust forward and ....

BBbrrrrrrrrrrriiiinnnnnnngggggg !!

... the phone rang.

[E Pericoloso Sporgersi]

BBbrrrrrrrrrrriiiinnnnnnngggggg !!

... the phone rang.

Just to say that I think it is spelled oscitant.

[Darb]

I tend to occasionally misspell in my dreams when I'm sleeping off a good drunk.

[E Pericoloso Sporgersi]

macabre

\muh-KAH-bruh\ , adjective;
1.
Gruesome and horrifying.
2.
Pertaining to or representing death, esp. its grimmer or uglier aspect.

Quotes:
The show brings Poe's macabre and melancholic tales & poems to life as Poe and his wife Virginia guide the audience through historic Mayslake Hall, taking them from the garrets to the dungeons and deep into the madness of Edgar Allan Poe.
-- "First Folio Announces 2010-2011 Season of Suspense", Broadway World

Those two men were much of the same build though of course Mr. d'Alcacer, quietly alive and spiritually watchful, did not resemble Jorgenson, who, without being exactly macabre, behaved more like an indifferent but restless corpse.
-- Joseph Conrad, The rescue: a romance of the shallows

Where I come from, people who sport exotic jewelry and tattoos, dress in black, and have interest in the macabre aren't called "Satanists" - they're called goths ...
-- felonius, The SoapBox, IBDoF.com

Origin:
Macabre relates to the Danse Macabre, a medieval allegory, but the etymology of the word itself is subject to speculation.

[Darb]

Tammy Faye Baker's overuse of mascara was quite macabre.

[KeE]

't was a Macabre sight when the macAbre clan caught up with the macOscitants; their yawing gait had tipped them off and now their corpses were manhandled with little or no haptic care into emptied whiskey barrels.
It just goes to show: When you're trying to steal a secret, It is better to save the imbibing of said secret for later.