Afternoon, readers! Thanksgiving is almost here, which means an absurd amount of delicious, fattening food and stampedes of greedy consumerists who will overtake the Walmarts and Macys and the Best Buys in the days and weeks following the holiday where you’re supposed to be thankful for everything you’ve already got.
It also means three days of work next week and an early issue. Look for it on stands Tuesday!
(As a side note, if you’re like me and will do anything to avoid the hollowed-eyed throngs of shoppers in the days before and after Thanksgiving but still need to get a head start on holiday shopping, check out our gift guide. You’re welcome.)
Let’s get to the Words Nobody Uses or Knows in this weeks issue. Best word of the issue is loquacious, which I think sounds like salacious? Not sure. It’s in Kathy Y. Wilson’s editorial on Bill Cosby and his recent string of no good very bad sexual assault accusations by various women.
loquacious: very talkative; fond of talking (adj.)
In this issue: ”
NPR is the nexus of Cosby’s identity in America as the loquacious raconteur (reality) and the benign All-American Dad (television).“
Loquacious raconteur. I have no idea what a raconteur is either; but it sounds French, so I keep thinking loquacious raconteur with a French accent in my head.
raconteur:
a person who tells stories or anecdotes in an amusing and clever way (n.)
Next word is vagaries in this week’s Sound Advice.
vagaries:
odd or unexpected changes in behavior or actions (n.)
In this issue: ”
Written and recorded in the winter months after solidifying Spencer and Pressley’s partnership (which came to include the vital input of percussionist/philosopher Ryan Clancy), Wormfood was a song cycle on the vagaries of love and the songs that detail those particular woes.”
Last is hamlet, also in Sound Advice.
hamlet: a small village, or a dramatic play written by Shakespeare in the 1600s (n.)
I had no idea hamlet ever meant anything other than Shakespeare’s play. CityBeat’s pretentious writers have been teaching me so much!
In this issue:
“Delavan is a farm country hamlet of less than 2,000 people located about halfway between Chicago and St. Louis.”
Enjoy the holidays, readers.
This article appears in Nov 19-25, 2014.