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Pawn
Word of the day: pawn As his hogs were off in the woods munching on pawn, Farmer Smith decided he was tired of just being used as a pawn by the moneylenders in town, so he made sure his prize pawn with its lovely feathers was safely penned up, then walked into town. He visited Continue reading
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Time
It’s time. No, it’s not time, it’s “time.” What I mean to say is that “time” is today’s word. “Time” comes from Old English, derived from the Germanic root word “timon” (to stretch or extend). The original meaning of “time” in English was what we today mean by “a long time.” It was such a Continue reading
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Man Ray
If you peruse the art of Man Ray, who was born August 27, 1890, you’ll see things like sewing machines, flat irons, needles, pins, thread, and other thing having to do with sewing and tailoring. Man Ray was painter, photographer, collagist, and worked in some harder-to-define media as well. He worked in Paris, for the Continue reading
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Antoine-Laurent de Lavoisier
It’s well known nowadays that combustion — fire, for one — is a process requiring oxygen. It doesn’t need any phlogiston to work, although for a century before the 1770s, scientists thought “phlogiston” was some sort of substance, and if it was included in another substance (like wood), that’s what enabled burning. It’s thanks to Continue reading
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August 27
It’s August 27, the anniversary of the first successful oil well (at least in the US), in Titusville, Pennsylvania. People knew about oil in the 1850s, of course. In some parts of the world you could get the stuff out of freestanding pools (like tar pits), and it had been used for thousands of years Continue reading
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August 26
Today is the anniversary of the adoption of the nineteenth amendment to the US Constitution. It’s usually described as “granting women the right to vote,” but the language itself is slightly different; it prohibits federal and state governments from denying the right to vote on the basis of sex. The US Constitution is actually a Continue reading
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Classes
Magpie had called a meeting in the little meadow next to Hare’s house. Everyone came, if only to see what sort of strange idea Magpie had this time. Magpie spent part of her day perched in the village near the woods, watching for shiny things to collect and listening to what the people were saying. Continue reading
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Eponyms
Words in English that began as someone’s name are “eponyms.” Probably the most-used eponym in English is “sandwich,” which is named after the Earl of Sandwich (1718 to 1792). The Earl’s given name was John Montagu, and supposedly he invented the “slice of meat between two pieces of bread.” It’s probably not true, but he Continue reading
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Hodmandod
In 1593 Gabriel Harvey wrote a piece called Pierce’s Supererogation, or a New Praise of the Old Ass. It was basically an extended insult of a fellow named Thomas Nashe, and in part he refers to him as “…a dodkin author, whose two swords are like the horns of a hodmandod…”. In this he was Continue reading
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August 25
It was August 25, 1835, that the New York Sun newspaper published one of the greatest stories ever — certainly their biggest scoop in history. The greatest astronomer of the time was Sir William Herschel, and he had made some astonishing observations from his “immense telescope of an entirely new principle,” built in South Africa. Continue reading
About Me
I’m Pete Harbeson, a writer located near Boston, Massachusetts. In addition to writing my own content, I’ve learned to translate for my loquacious and opinionated pup Chocolate Bossypaws. I shouldn’t be surprised, but she mostly speaks in doggerel. You can find her contributions tagged with Chocolatiana.
Check out my other blog, Techlimitics, where I’m grappling with the nature of simplicity.
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