Tuesday, July 10, 2007

Fat words : Enceinte, , Avoirdupois, Parturient, Adipose

Dear Sumant,

Recently there was this theme on "My word a day" website about being heavy and they came up with these words. I only knew Avoirdupois.

My favorite is Enceinte
1. carrying an unborn child; pregnant: "She was found guilty, but sentencing was delayed, as her counsel said that she was enceinte."

From the same site
Like any other movement embraced by celebrities, pregnancy has acquired, over the past couple of years a sort of hip cachet. It's a fashion, literally, and with enceinte moppets like Hudson and Liv Tyler chewing up press pages, elder flashbulb chasers like Demi Moore (who some maintain is the ur-goddess of the fecund celebrity after her alabaster-skinned nude cover for Vanity Fair in 1991) and Madonna are getting in on the act, by hinting that they too will soon be signing up for another tour of gestational duty.

"Her joy at being enceinte is troubled by memories of her own oft pregnant mother, who 'always seemed to me exhausted, burdened.'

Perhaps one of the more noticeable sentence using this word was coined by queen Victoria
"I positively think that ladies who are always enceinte quite disgusting; it is more like a rabbit or guinea-pig than anything else and really it is not very nice."

Victoria (1819-1901). British monarch, Queen of Great Britain and Ireland. [Letter to her daughter Louisa, Princess Frederick William of Prussia.] Letter (June 15, 1859).

Google had a lot of hits about "I love Lucy being enciente"

The word is pronounced like "awn saynt" like "on saint" I guess. Funnily it rhymes with insane. So easy way to remember this word will be to imagine that you are asking a pregnant woman "How she is ? " and she answers that "She is insane because a saint made her enciente".

Another beautiful website I discovered for learning words is "Alpha Dictionary" .

Sunday, July 08, 2007

Traipse on past few days


Dear Sumant,

Today was the first time I flew in a two seater plane. Thanks to Max and his dad. His dad flew from Chicago to see him and Max arranged to have a joy ride for some 8 people. The ride was flawless and it was a memorable experience. It was an interesting conversation with his dad. Knowing about the little history of their 61 year old family plane.

Yesterday I went to another party at Ray's Invitation ( Look at the artistic poster above) with Kressa and Lauren and that was a blast. The party was at Pleasant Hill road celebrating 4th of July. My favorite local band "The Bourbon Knights" played there.

I have ordered few more books from Library including several of Edward De Bono. So that should be interesting.

I watched couple of movies. "300" and "Pirates of the Caribbean". 300 is visually stunning movie however the movie is all about revenge and pride. The two things which are source of all pain. The movie is not uplifting and so doesn't incite my approval. Pirates of the Caribbean is again marinated with stunning visuals and unexpected twists to the story line. I enjoyed it and would recommend to you.

That's for now
Sumant Sumant

Tuesday, July 03, 2007

New Books

Dear Sumant,

Today I am very very excited. I got several books including three books on graph theory (including two my Dr. W.D. Walli's) and a couple on young Shakespeare series (Macbeth and Hamlet). The last time I read Shakespeare was a very long time ago. I read in Hindi ("Desh Desh ki Kahaniyan") and it was a book I remember my dad got me at Lucknow station on the way to our annual visit to Nanaji's house. That should be I believe at least 25 yrs ago. Wow !! I also got the book "A word a day". I been member of wordsmit for I believe now over 10 years and at one point of time I scrounge through all the word lists since the very inception of this amazing website. So hopefully the book has new words and interesting words that I can chew on for few weeks.

That's for now and have a great Independence Day
Sumant Sumant

A short screed on Scarf, Butt and Splice Joints

Scarf Joint - It is used especially in wood work and metal work when the length of the material is not long enough. The pieces overlap and are glued. Another way to make a more durable is using splice joint and butt joint. The splice joint is also for elongation whereas the butt joint seems to me is for case when you have to join at an angle. Usually one uses screw or other things to reinforce it. Another word that was asked at today's readers digest word power was screed and it means a long boring speech. Merriam Webster has few more definitions including a leveling device drawn over freshly poured concrete.
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