from the OED:

adrad (adj) - [adrad of] fightened, terrified

adytum (n) - the innermost part of a temple; a private chamber, a sanctum

romantagonist (n) - a romantic antagonist- a love interest who starts out as an antagonist to the protagonist.

E.g., Miss Eliza Bennett & Mr. Darcy. Or Buffy and Angel. Or Buffy and Spike.


Any others leap to mind?

I got about three hours of sleep last night, as the poor tiny person spent the latter half of the night vomiting. Poor guy. He did get a three a.m. bath, though, which at least seemed amusing in its novelty. He is now sacked out having an epic nap. Good on him.

So! To distract from my enormous fatigue, here are some words, freshly wrangled from the contentious pages of the OED (short-short version):

addorsed (adj)- turned back to back (heraldry)

ademption (n)- the action of taking away; law- revocation of a grant or bequest

adit (n)- 1. a horizontal passage leading into a mine, for the purpose of entrance or drainage
2. Entrance, access

1. I just read Fast Forward 2, ed. Lou Anders, and The Graveyard Book, by Neil Gaiman. Both very excellent books, completely different, and I want to talk about them more at greater length. But not right now, because there's some design work I'm supposed to be doing.

2. I just got my contributor copies for copyediting mental_floss! Yay! I didn't know I was going to get those. My name is very small in the "Special Thanks" section. I feel cool.

3. I've decided to do NaNoWriMo this year.

4. The tiny person starts "school" on Monday. He's not talking the way one might expect a two-year-old to, and our pediatrician recommends that he start socializing with folks his own age, the idea being that a) when he's around people who aren't so quick to guess his every whim, he'll begin expressing them aloud, and b) peer pressure can't be overrated. If the other people his size are talking he will, too. Or so we hope.

5. acuate (adj.) - made sharp or pungent; sharp-pointed
(v) - to make sharp or pungent

acoll (v)- throw the arms around the neck of; embrace

accouchement (n)- childbirth, a confinement

accoy (v)- calm, quiet; coax, daunt

accresce (v)- 1. increase or grow by addition
2. fall or accrue to

Aceldema (n)- a field of bloodshed; a scene of slaughter

ackers (n)- coins, notes, money (Br. military slang)

accite (v)- 1. summon
2. excite
3. quote


accloy (v)- 1. prickle (a horse) with a nail while shoeing; lame
2. stop up (an aperture); obstruct, clog, choke
3. overfill, burden, oppress
4. disgust, become offensive to

accoil (v)- gather together, collect


The accs have been good pages for this, and they're not over yet.

absquatulate (v)- depart, decamp

absterge (v) - wipe away, cleanse

abtruse (adj)- 1. hidden, secret
2. difficult to conceive of or apprehend; recondite

absume (v)- consume gradually

acate (n)- 1. purchasing contract, bargain
2. things purchased; provisions not made in the home; dainties

accend (v)- kindle, set on fire

accidie (n)- sloth, torpor, apathy; now also, black despair

accinge (v)- prepare for action; apply oneself


Some words I'm skipping because they're very close to other words with very similar meanings; I chose to include accend because I find it interesting how close it is to incendiary. Language drift/evolution is neat.

Absume seems like a good word for a sunday morning. I absumed my breakfast, and now I'm in the process of absuming coffee, while accinging to get a little work done.

abime (n)- variant of abyss

ablaqueate (v)- to expose the roots (of a tree) by loosening or removing soil

abnormous (adj)- irregular, misshapen

abraid (v)- 1. wrench out (a sword)
2. start or startle out of sleep
3. shout out
4. rise nauseously in the stomach


I love you, English language! Ablaquate is such a specialized word, while abraid is doing some serious (and wildly disparate!) heavy lifting over there. Although I guess meanings 1, 3, and 4 would certainly accomplish 2.

I read this yesterday, and I so enjoyed reading about the poor vilipended words, I decided to go on a hunt for more obscure words, for my own delectation.

We have the short, two-volume version of the OED. (If I ever have pots of money and ample shelf space ((ha)) I will invest in the 20-volume set.) I decided to look for words that appeal to me and that I don't know, starting in the As. I was going to pull one from every page, but some pages don't have obscure or whimsical words. Page 1 of the As, for example, was variants on a and acronyms like AA and AAA. So I'll just flip until I find a word I like, and then transcribe it into a notebook, and, through the magic of this "science" all the kids are talking about, hence onto this journal and the interwebs.

Whew! Long windy. Without further adieu or explanation--

abditory (n)- a concealed repository