When in the blue hell am I EVER going to use “spargefaction” in a sentence? spargefaction Definitions from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License n. The act of sprinkling. from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English n. The act of sprinkling. from The Century Dictionary and...
Ah. An appropriate and cool word to describe the day’s festivities: commensality Definitions from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License n. The act of eating together. from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English n. Fellowship at table; the act or practice of eating at the same...
This column has discussed book after book that has been banned and/or challenged for various reasons. Most incidents are the result of ignorance and intolerance, others may even be innocently well-intentioned; but what happens when entire libraries are threatened in order to serve the arrogant hatred of racism from...
I read this in my news feed this morning and thought I would share the nugget of wisdom: A professor held up a black book and said, “This book is red.” The students unanimously retorted, “No.” The professor calmly insisted, “Yes, it is.” The students again challenged and said,...
William Golding’s debut novel follows a group of British schoolboys whose plane crashes on the shore of an uninhabited island. As well intentioned their attempt to cope with the situation and govern themselves may have been they instead regress to primal instincts and the mentality of humanity’s earliest hunter...
To join the elite group known as American Mensa a person must score among the top 2% of an “accepted standardized intelligence test”. To put it mildly, the members of Mensa are some of the smartest humans alive; so when it comes to all things academic they know what...
For a while now I’ve read rants, seen graphics on Facebook, and shared personal conversations with people complaining about the use of the hash symbol (#) on the internet. To be honest, I think some of the complaints are well warranted- the use of it, like everything else in...
I’ve been asked before why I, being of Italian descent, don’t celebrate Columbus Day. The answer to why the very idea of this day disgusts me is very simple and explained perfectly in the masterful words of Kurt Vonnegut: “As children we were taught to memorize this year ...
English author Neil Gaiman’s fan base spread worldwide with his critically acclaimed Sandman graphic novel series in the 1990s. Since then he has solidified his literary mark with equally-impressive and award-winning novels. Last week, however, his novel, Neverwhere, became the target of contention that has engulfed a New Mexico...
“If all it takes is growing a little facial fuzz in a fun and interactive way for a month to help raise awareness for such an important issue, then why isn’t everyone doing it? What’s your excuse? Cancer knows no boundaries- not sex, not race, not age, not social...