Tidbits of Grand Forks - November 19, 2020

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November 19, 2020

Published by: Wick Publications

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Issue # 1,195

TIDBITS LOOKS UP WORDS IN THE ®

DICTIONARY

by Janet Spencer

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Come along with Tidbits as we learn about dictionaries!

DICTIONARY FACTS

• Robert Cawdrey first released his book “A Table Alphabeticall” in 1604, one of the first dictionaries of the English language.

• Samuel Johnson’s “A Dictionary of the English Language” was published in England in 1755. It was the first dictionary to try to include all English words with definitions and examples. It was the leading dictionary until the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) appeared 173 years later. Johnson did the work on the dictionary by himself. He was paid the equivalent of $250,000 for the job.

• Johnson thought his dictionary would take three years to complete. Actually it took nine.

The OED was estimated to take 10 years but it took 70. Meanwhile, work on the definitive dictionary of the Welsh language began in 1921 but was not completed until 2002.

• Samuel Johnson left the letter X out of his dictionary, claiming that X “begins no word in the English language.” The current OED lists about 400 words that start with X. • The unabridged OED includes definitions for about 600,000 words. If laid end to end, the typescript for the first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary would have stretched over 200 miles.

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Quiz Bits

1.

2.

3.

4.

5. Name the longest word without a vowel. (hint: starts with the letter “R”).

What percent of English words 6. What is the most commonly contain a silent letter? used word in the English What is the only letter in the language?

English language that is never 7.

Name the song that contains silent? this lyric: “You went to school What is the only letter that does to learn, girl, Things you not show up in the names of never, never knew before, any of the 50 states?

I before E except What is the shortest complete after TRIVIA C”. sentence in the English language?

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DICTIONARY FACTS

• The word “unabridged” on a dictionary does not mean it contains all the words in the language, but actually means that it contains all the words that appeared in previous edition.

• The world’s bestselling dictionary is the Xinhua Zidian Chinese language dictionary, which has sold over 400 million copies worldwide.

• The word “esquivalience” defined as “the willful avoidance of one’s official responsibilities” appears in the New Oxford American Dictionary.

It’s actually a fake word, designed to protect the copyright of the dictionary from plagiarists.

• “Aardvark” isn’t the first word in the dictionary. The Oxford English Dictionary lists several words before it, including aa (a stream), aal (a mulberry), aam (an old unit of liquid measure), aandblom (a wild flower), and aapa (a term, originating in South Asia, for an older sister).

NEW WORDS • Around 1,000 new words are added to the dictionary every year. Words recently added to dictionary include: • Latinx: gender-neutral version of Latino or Latina

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5. What piece of sports equipment did Rev. Robert Adams Paterson revolutionize in 1848 when he made it out of a latex called gutta-percha?

6. Which “Rocky” actor once played in the NFL? 7. When was the first Wimbledon Championship held—1877, 1892 or 1907?

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LETTER FACTS

• The letters “A” and “I” are the shortest English words.

• The letter S is the most frequently used letter to start words, because it combines with every letter except B, Z, and X. • The letter T is the most frequently used consonant. The letter E is the most common letter, found in 11% of all words.

• Q is the least common letter in the English alphabet, followed by J and Z. • W is the only letter in the alphabet that has 3 syllables; all others have one.

• The dot over the letters “i” and “j” is called a “tittle” from the Latin “titulus” meaning “a small mark.”

• Invented in 1524 by an Italian, the letter “J” was the last letter to be added to the alphabet.

• Only four letters (A, E, O, L) are ever doubled at the beginning of a word (aardvark, eel, ooze, llama, etc.), and more words start with double O than any others.

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• The English word “alphabet” comes from the names of the first two letters of the Greek alphabet: “alpha” and “beta.”

• The 26 letters of the English alphabet make up more than 40 distinct sounds.

• About 100 languages are based on an alphabet very similar to the English alphabet, making it one of the most widely used alphabets in the world. While some languages have a few more and others a few less, they all share the 23 core letters originally found in the Roman alphabet of the Latin language. (The Romans lacked J, V, and W.) • There are about 250 alphabets in the history of the human language. Of those, only 50 are still in use today. Half of those are found in India.

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WORD FACTS

• The English words with the largest number of separate definitions are the words “set” (430 separate definitions, which take 60,000 words to explain) and “run” with 645 separate meanings for the verb form of the word alone.

• The 28-letter “antidisestablishmentarianism” is considered the longest “non-coined, non-technical” word in most dictionaries. It was created to describe the Church of England in the 19th century.

• The word “incomprehensibilities,” with 21 letters, has been named the longest word “in common usage.”

• The top ten most-used words are: “the,” “be,” “to,” “of,” “and,” “a,” “in,” “that,” “have,” and “I.” These ten words alone account for 25% of the total words we use.

• The most-used adjective in English is “good” but the word “bad” doesn’t show up until the 23rd slot, right below “public,” “few,” and “important.”

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• The most-used verb in English is “be.” The mostused noun is “time” which dominated all other nouns including runners-up “person,” “year,” “way,” and “day.”

• C. S. Lewis coined the word “verbicide” to denote the killing of a word or the distortion of its original meaning. For instance, “hussy” comes from the word housewife and used to refer to the mistress of a household, not the disreputable woman it refers to today. To “quell” originally meant “to kill” and now it just means “to subdue.” “Meat” used to denote any solid food, not just the flesh of animals. “Awful” used to mean “full of awe” rather than “terrible.” The word “artisan” used to mean “made by hand” but now means “quality.”

• Richard Lederer coined the word “verbivore” to describe someone who devours and feasts on words.

THE SANTA CLAUS GIRLS NEED YOUR HELP! For over 100 years the Santa Claus Girls have helped children — in Grand Forks & East Grand Forks — have a Merry Christmas who otherwise might not have the opportunity.

This year 1,200 children will receive a gift package & the cost of providing this small package to each child amounts to $40,000 per year. Your generous donations make this very For more information, Call 701-740-4900 successful program possible. Thank You!

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• On Nov. 28, 1582, William Shakespeare, 18, and Anne Hathaway, 26, pay a 40-pound bond for their marriage license in Stratford-upon-Avon. Six months later, Anne gives birth to their daughter, Susanna, and two years later, to twins.

• On Nov. 27, 1868, Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer leads an early-morning attack on a band of Cheyenne in Oklahoma. Custer did not attempt to identify the group of Cheyenne, or to make even a cursory reconnaissance.

Had he done so, he would have discovered that they were peaceful people and the village was on reservation soil.

• On Nov. 26, 1922, in Egypt's Valley of the Kings, British archaeologists become the first souls to enter King Tutankhamen's tomb in more than 3,000 years. Inside were several thousand priceless objects, including a gold coffin containing the mummy of the teenage king.

• On Nov. 29, 1942, coffee joins the list of items rationed in the United States during World War II. Butter, sugar and milk had been rationed earlier.

By the end of the year, cars were limited to 3 gallons of gas per week.

• On Nov. 23, 1966, Elvis Presley's 22nd film, "Spinout," in which Elvis played a singing race car driver, opens in theaters.

• On Nov. 24, 1971, a hijacker calling himself D.B. Cooper parachutes from a Northwest Orient Airlines 727 into a raging thunderstorm over Washington state. He had $200,000 in ransom money and was wearing only wraparound sunglasses, a thin suit and a raincoat. No trace of Cooper was ever found, but in 1980 a child found $5,880 of the ransom money.

• On Nov. 25, 1990, after a howling wind and rainstorm on Thanksgiving Day, Washington state's historic floating Lacey V. Murrow Memorial Bridge slowly breaks apart and sinks to the bottom of Lake Washington. News crews captured the whole thing on camera.

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• Deceased scientists and researchers who have contributed to the study of Mars will, in a sense, live forever on the red planet: Craters larger than 37 miles are named in their honor.

• Hans Steininger, who is said to have had the longest beard in the world, died in 1567 from tripping over that beard while running from a fire.

• The blue whale is earth's largest living creature, surpassing even most dinosaurs. Not only can it reach over 100 feet in length and weigh more than 100 tons, but its heart can tip the scale at 1,300 pounds and is the size of a small car, while its arteries are big enough for a full-grown human to swim through -- not that we recommend you go for a swim and attempt it.

• In 2007, Iran claimed 14 squirrels found near the nation's borders were actually spies.

• New York City's Flatiron building used to cause enough downdrafts to lift the skirts of women passing by, giving a then-daring view of their legs and ankles. The phenomenon resulted in groups of young men regularly gathering on 23rd Street to watch.

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• People with autism are less likely to catch yawns.

• The record for most times being hit by a baseball pitch -- a whopping 287 -- belongs to Hughie Jennings, who finally got smart and retired in 1918.

• A bizarre form of Victorian-era entertainment was the "Fasting Girl." Young women appeared in public exhibits and dazzled spectators with claims that they ate nothing at all. Obviously they munched in secret and most were eventually caught at it, though, tragically, some starved to death in a bid for authenticity.

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• In one scene as The Dude writes a check for 68 cents at Ralph’s grocery, he watches George H.W. Bush give the “This aggression will not stand” press interview live on television. President Bush gave the interview on the White House lawn on Sunday, August 5, 1990, three days after the Iraqi Army invaded Kuwait. The Dude's check, however, is dated September 11, 1991, indicating that The Dude is so broke that he had to post-date a 68 cent check by over one year.

• “The Big Lebowski” is a 1998 comedy film written, produced, and directed by Joel and Ethan Coen. It stars Jeff Bridges as Jeffrey “The Dude” Lebowski, a slacker and bowler with a laid-back attitude and a fondness for cannabis. He is assaulted by some thugs who mistake him for a different guy named Jeff Lebowski. The movie’s • In one scene, a briefcase is hurled out of the wintitle establishes that the other Lebowski is the “big” Lebdow of a moving car. In take after take, the briefcase owski because of his wealth. The movie is a mad-cap adventure resulting from circumstances surrounding this failed to achieve the desired arc. Finally the driver (John Candy) was told to drive in reverse while an case of mistaken identity. off-scene crew member hurled the briefcase into the • Before filming a scene, Jeff Bridges would rub his knuck- car. The film was then reversed. les in his eyes to make his eyes bloodshot, to achieve the • The bowling alley scenes were filmed at the former look of a stoner.

Holly Star Lanes near Santa Monica and the U.S. • A lot of the Dude’s clothes in the movie were Jeff Bridg- 101 freeway exit ramp. The bowling alley has since es’s own clothes, including his Jellies sandals, which he been torn down and a new elementary school stands still owns and uses to this day. For much of the movie he in its place. was dressed in boxer shorts, t-shirt, and bathrobe.

• The Dude is present in every scene in the movie, • The bowling shirt The Dude wears in the movie bears the even if it’s just through a window, in the background. logo for a company called Medina Sod. The shirt once belonged to a man named Art Myers, who was the fore- • The Dude says “man” 147 times in the movie, or man at Medina Sod in Medina, Ohio. The costumers for about 1.5 times a minute. The word “dude” is used the film found the shirt in a thrift shop in L.A. and figured roughly 161 times. The F-word (or variation thereof) can be heard 292 times. it displayed the perfect amount of grunge for the part.

• In the script, The Dude mentions that he was a roadie for • The film bombed at the box office, making an aneMetallica on their (fictional) “Speed of Sound” tour and mic $5 million over its opening weekend, and barerefers to the band members as a “bunch of assholes.” The ly covering its $15 million budget at the domestic members of Metallica were flattered to be referred to in a box office. But since its initial release, the movie Coen Brothers movie, even if it was in a derogatory way. has gained a cult following, to the point where “Big On the other hand, during a bowling scene, a song by the Lebowski” festivals are held at various cities every Eagles plays on the muzak, and The Dude later mentions year. Sales of the movie on VHS, DVD, and Blu-ray that he hates the Eagles. Eagles founder Glenn Frey later turned the film into a cash cow. confronted Jeff Bridges about that scene in the movie, • “Rolling Stone” proclaimed “The Big Lebowski” which made for an uncomfortable moment. the “Best Stoner Movie of All Time.”

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November 9, 2020

• This is a wonderful tip received via e-mail: If you have a panic button for your car alarm, keep your keys by the bedside. If you experience a problem during the night, trip the panic alarm.

Let your trusted neighbors know about your intention, and they will be able to assist you.

• “Great gravy is only a plastic bag away! This is my tip for separating the fat from pan drippings to make gravy.

I take a quart-size plastic bag and set it in a glass measuring cup. Pour the pan drippings through a strainer, right into the bag. Let it sit for 15-20 minutes, and the fat will separate to the top.

Seal the bag, and snip a small hole in a bottom corner, drain the liquid into a saucepan to make gravy. It’s that easy.” — T.C. in Idaho • Whenever I am baking and the recipe calls for, say, 1 cup of honey (or some other sticky substance), I used to pour the honey into the measuring cup but then have a hard time getting all the honey back out of the cup and into the mixing bowl. Now I rinse the measuring cup with water right before measuring, or spray with nonstick cooking spray. It slides right out!

• To create a self-watering area for potted plants while you are on vacation, set plants in the bathtub or in a kiddie pool and use a length of cotton rope to wick water from the bathtub to the plant’s roots. You can either stick it up the holes in the bottom of the pot or dig it down a few inches into the soil.

This should get you by for a week or so.

• If you have a table that’s wobbly because of an uneven leg, and you are a wine drinker, you’re in luck. Take a wine cork, cut it in small slices and glue the slices to the uneven leg until the table no longer wobbles. Easy!

Send your tips to Now Here’s a Tip, 628 Virginia Drive, Orlando, FL 32803.

by Matilda Charles

Act Now to Change Your Medicare Plan

Have you finished making your decisions about your Medicare plan for 2021? If you're going to make a change, you have only a short time to pick a new one.

The deadline is Dec. 7.

There are so many options: Medicare Advantage, a supplemental plan or the traditional Medicare. And there are many things to consider within those options -- the drugs we currently take, eye exams, hearing aids, annual preventive tests and more.

The place to start is with your current plan. By now you should have received your Medicare Annual Notice of Change Letter if you have an Advantage or Part D plan. (You won't get one for a Supplemental plan.)

The letter will itemize any changes to your 2021 plan, including price. Compare your current plan with any changes in your plan for next year.

Have your needs changed this year? Are there new drugs you're taking? Is your doctor included in your network? What about the pharmacy you like to use? Are you likely to need a procedure in 2021? What else are you likely to need in the next year?

Look at your Medicare & You 2021 book that came in the mail. Check inside the front cover for information on lowering insulin costs, acupuncture for back pain, telehealth visits and more. (If you can't find your copy, go online to www.medicare.gov/Pubs/pdf/10050-Medicare-and-You.pdf.)

If you want to consider making a change, go online to Medicare.gov and look at plans for your area. For any changes to a supplemental plan, call that plan directly.

Don't try to do this all in one day. Give yourself time to consider what you need, and ask questions.

Get personalized help at State Health Insurance Assistance Program (SHIP) at www.shiptacenter.org if you need it. Click on SHIP Locator for listings by state, or call them at 877-839-2675.

by Freddy Groves

Letters Reach Out to Troubled Vets

We've been in a stressful period for many long months, and now here come the holidays. It's going to be different this year: fewer (or no) family get-togethers, no parties, little shopping at stores ... in other words, a potentially lonely time for many veterans who are sad or anxious or who have PTSD. The Department of Veterans Affairs has done a randomized evaluation of its Caring Letters Program to test the effects of sending a written letter every month to veterans who have called the Veteran Crisis Line. One result was that when asked, 85% of psychiatric patient veterans agreed or strongly agreed that they would like to receive caring communication through the mail, and the period of time was monthly for one year. (This rated higher than receiving email or text messages.) Granted, given the setting, most of them said that contact with a mental health counselor or physician was preferred, but I expect that a message from a friend or acquaintance or another veteran would likely be just as welcome.

At this point, the Veteran Crisis Line has sent letters to 90,000 veterans over the past year.

What can you do? You can reach out to a veteran you suspect might be struggling, whether it's with suicidal thoughts or just loneliness. Monthly cards or letters in the mail to say hello are small things that can be huge to receive when someone is alone and struggling. Keep the communication brief, but caring.

If you honestly don't know any veterans who might be struggling right now, make a call to the chaplain of your local American Legion or Veterans of Foreign Wars and ask if there's anyone they're worried about.

If you're going to do this, make a commitment to yourself right now that you'll do this monthly for a minimum of one year. The impact of your effort might be greater than you'll ever know.

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DIFFICULT WORDS

• Start with the Latin word “columna” meaning “pillar” or “column.” Morph that into Italian and it becomes “colonello” and now denotes the person at the head of a “column” of soldiers. But when that word enters the French language, the French have trouble pronouncing the word because it has two L sounds very close together. They change the word into “coronel” and pronounce it “ker-anel.” Then it goes into the English language. The English restore the original Italian spelling with two L’s: “colonel” but they continue to pronounce it the way the French had, except that they drop the middle syllable. And that is why “colonel” is now pronounced “kernel.”

• The town of Worcester, England, is pronounced “Wooster” and rhymes with “rooster.” The word “shire” means “county” in England’s English, and is pronounced “sure” like the end of “Hampshire.” When a sauce was invented in the shire of Worcester, it was called Worcestershire sauce and is pronounced: WOOster-sure sauce.

• The Greek prefix “para” means “apart from” as in the words “paralegal” and “paramedic.” The Greek word “pherna” means a dowry. The word “parapherna” denoted “property apart from a dowry” and denoted the odds and ends of property that a woman brought into her marriage, aside from the dowry. These items belonged to the wife and could not be sold or disposed of by the husband without her permission. Now “paraphernalia” simply means “bits and pieces” of any sort.

• Quechua is the name of a language spoken in South America in the region of the Andes. The English language has absorbed a number of Quechua words, including “jerky” and “puma.”

Another Quechua word that gives English speakers a headache is their name for a starchy herb which yields high-protein seeds: quinoa. It’s pronounced “keen-wah.” ...cont'd

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DIFFICULT WORDS (cont.)

• The original definition of “lieutenant” was “an army officer next in rank to a captain, who commands the company in the absence of the captain.” The word comes from the French “lieu” meaning “place” as “in lieu of” combined with “tenant” meaning “holder” as in “holding a position.” A lieutenant is a placeholder for a superior officer.

DIFFERENCES:: DIFFERENCES 1. Boy's hat is different. 2. Castle has a flag. 3. Par 3 sign has moved. 4. Golf balls have become baseballs. 5. Golf club is longer. 6. Some distant trees are missing. © 2020 King Features Synd., All rights reserved.

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• In Borneo the local natives speak Malay. In that language, the word for man is “orang” and the word for forest is “hutan.” Put those words together to get “organ-hutan” meaning “man of the forest.” That came into English as “orangutan.”

Many people mistakenly add an entry G on the ending, but there is no “tang” in “orangutan.”

• “Mucus” comes from the Latin word for slime, and denotes any gummy substance. “Mucous” has the same origin but denotes the membranes that secret mucus: the mucous membranes in the nose secrete mucus when you have a cold.

• Another word for mucus is “phlegm” which comes from the Greek word “phlégma” meaning “inflamed.” The Greek physician Hippocrates theorized that health and emotions were ruled by four “humors” of the body, including blood, yellow bile, black bile, and phlegm. According to Hippocrates, a person who has too much phlegm in their system is phlegmatic, making them unemotional and calm.

• Leonhard Fuchs was a German botanist, born in 1501. In 1562 he published a book containing over 500 drawings and descriptions of plants.

Fuchs had been dead for more than a century when another botanist described a small flowering shrub discovered on a Caribbean island.

That botanist named the new shrub after Leonhard Fuchs, calling it the Fuchsia. Because the flowers were a brilliant color, that color also became known as fuchsia.

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Quiz Answers

1. 60% 2. V 3. X 4. “I am.”

5. Rhythm 6. The 7. “ABC” by The Jackson 5

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Sports Answers 1. The Penn State Nittany Lions 2. Montreal Canadiens (1986), New Jersey Devils (1995, 2000) and Colorado Avalanche (1996).

3. 1984 4. Clyde Drexler 5. The golf ball 6. Carl Weathers (Oakland Raiders, 1970-71) 7. 1877

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