“Stars jammed the sky.”  “The moon was nearly full, and the high desert air was so clear that light silvered every detail of the landscape.”  Blasphemy, Book 2 in the Wyman Ford series by Douglas Preston 

Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart (CAPTCHA) is an interactive feature added to web forms to distinguish whether a human or automated agent is using the form.  Typically, it requires entering text corresponding to a distorted image or a sound stream.  https://csrc.nist.gov/glossary/term/Completely_Automated_Public_Turing_test_to_tell_Computers_and_Humans_Apart 

Beef short ribs are a prized cut for slow cooking.  Cooking them slowly breaks down the tough connective tissues and the meat becomes fall apart tender.  And because they are beautifully marbled with fat, they are more succulent and juicy than other slow cooking cuts of beef such as chuck and brisket.  My favourite method is to braise using the oven because you get extra flavour from the beef and surface of the sauce caramelising in the oven, even though it’s cooked covered the whole time.  Recipe posted by Nagi at https://www.recipetineats.com/braised-beef-short-ribs-in-red-wine-sauce/ 

Cádiz, the province and city on Spain’s southwestern edge, is an underdog—and I’m among the many travelers who have spent years overlooking it.  I know Andalusia, the southern region it is part of, well.   People have been living in Cádiz for more than 3,000 years, making it one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in Europe:  Traces of the Phoenicians, Carthaginians, Romans and North African Muslims, who once ruled these lands can all be found on a short walk through the old town.  Today, those who are from that part of the city, say, facetiously, that they are from “Cádiz, Cádiz, Cádiz”—the original city of Cádiz, in the city of Cádiz, in the province of Cádiz.  (Those who live in the new part of town, along the 2.5-mile Cortadura Beach, are referred to as “Bedouins” for having traveled into the “desert” to settle down.)  Sebastian Modek   See pictures at https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/03/travel/cadiz-an-underrated-corner-of-spain.html 

A.Word.A.Day with Anu Garg

What’s common among a spa, mocha coffee, and capri pants?  All three are toponyms, words derived from place names.  The word spa is coined after Spa, a resort town in Belgium.  The mocha coffee is named after Mocha, a port city in Yemen, a trading center for coffee.  And capris got their name from Capri, an Italian island, where they were popularized.  Such words are known as toponyms, from Greek topos (place).

yahoo  noun:  YAH-hoo, interjection:  ya-HOO)

noun:  A person who is boorish, loud, disruptive, etc.
interjection:  Expressing excitement, delight, or triumph.

For noun:  After Yahoos, a race of brutish creatures in Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels. Earliest documented use:  1751.
For interjection:  Apparently of echoic origin.  Earliest documented use: 1976.

Feedback to A.Word.A.Day

From:  Wilson Fowlie  Subject:  Virtual travel   Funny how language changes.  Before this past year, the sentence “We can travel virtually any time” would almost certainly have meant “We can travel at virtually any time,” whereas now it means “We can travel virtually at any time”.

From:  Helen Pringle  Subject: Travel  “There is no frigate like a book To take us lands away . . . ” - Emily Dickinson

From:  David Ryder  Subject:  Lilliput  On his travels in Ireland, Swift would have spent time in County Westmeath where he got the name Lilliput.  A village beside a beautiful lake.  There is an adventure park there today, named like the Japanese Park, Lilliput Adventure Park. 

From: Jean Marshall   Subject:  Lilliputians in England  The word lilliput reminds me of a delightful children’s novel Mistress Masham’s Repose by T.H. White.  A 10-year-old girl on a crumbling estate in England discovers some Lilliputians living in a neglected garden who were brought back by Gulliver but escaped.

From:  Caroline Rackley  Subject:  Laputa  Check out the modern film by Hayao Miyazaki, Laputa: Castle in the Sky.  Masterful and highly entertaining.

From:  Rob Hardy   Subject:  Laputan  My favorite use of this word is in the film Dr. Strangelove, where Major Kong (Slim Pickens), the bomber pilot commander, declares, “Primary target, the ICBM complex at Laputa.” 

From:  Michael Rothschild  Subject:  yahoo  For many years we owned a travel agency, Gulliver’s Travels, in Madison, WI.  Our slogan was “Where all our clients are giants.”  Inside the office, though, we added that some were yahoos. 
From:  Rebecca Andre   Subject:  A pandemic word I created  A word I made up during the pandemic.  I was fortunate enough to get vaccinated early on and proudly referred to myself as a vaccinati (as in “literati”, etc.).  AWADmailIssue 975   

literati = intellectuals, those who love, read and comment on literature

glitterati = wealthy, chic, famous, fashionable celebrities

vaccinati = vaccinated people 

The Capitol Steps are an American political-satire group which has been performing since 1981.   Most of the Capitol Steps' material parodies well-known contemporary songs, usually introduced with a short skit.  The songs are interspersed with other routines, including a spoonerism routine ("Lirty Dies") near the end of each performance with innuendoes about recent scandals.  They have released over 40 albums, primarily song parodies.  Originally consisting of congressional staffers who performed around Washington, D.C., the troupe is now primarily made up of professional actors and singers.  The Capitol Steps have performed on PBS, public radio and in small- and medium-size venues around the United States.  On January 13, 2021 The Capitol Steps announced via Twitter that they would be shutting down after 39 years of performing.  The shutdown is due to the loss of revenue as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic.  They released several albums during the Obama administration, including Mock the Vote, How to Succeed in Congress without Really Lying, Fiscal Shades of Gray, Take the Money and Run for President, Desperate Housemembers, Liberal Shop of Horrors, and Obama Mia.  They released Orange Is the New Barack in 2017.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitol_Steps

Upon an island hard to reach, the East Beast sits upon his beach.  Upon the west beach sits the West Beast.  Each beach beast thinks he's the best beast.  Which beast is best? . . . Well, I thought at first that the East was best and the West was worst.  Then I looked again from the west to the east and I liked the beast on the east beach least.  Theodor Seuss Geisel  https://www.poemhunter.com/poem/west-beast-east-beast/ 

Jet lag is a drag:  west is best, east is a beast.  https://thistourlife.com/jet-lag/ 

West is best; East is beast by Paul Barclay on Big Ideas  What do you know about European history?  Oxford historian Norman Davies says that’s all tainted by stereotypes and a narrow focus on only Western Europe.  The title of his lecture says it all:  West is best, East is beast.  But in fact, it’s really what went on in East Europe that has changed the world.  https://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/bigideas/west-is-best3b-east-is-beast/5350148 

East side is a beast—west is best.  Mr. Mayor TV show  January 2021           

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 2336  March 10, 2021