Oct

24

Word Of The Week: October 24th, 2009

Posted by Christopher Waldrop

October 24, 2009 | 1 Comment

Someone suggested ruddy to me as a Word of the Week, and it really got me thinking. I know ruddy means reddish, or maybe orange-red, like rust, and ruddy, red, and rust all start with r. Do they have a common ancestor, or is it just a strange coincidence? According to the Oxford English Dictionary, [...]

Oct

17

Word Of The Week: October 17th, 2009

Posted by Christopher Waldrop

October 17, 2009 | 2 Comments

My first computer had 640K and a monochrome monitor and I thought it was so cool. And for its time it was a pretty good computer. I even had a modem and could download things at the staggering rate of 1200 baud. (I’m not sure, but I believe at that rate it would take 297 [...]

Sep

19

Word Of The Week: September 19th, 2009.

Posted by Christopher Waldrop

September 19, 2009 | 1 Comment

The other day I was in my office and my boss called and said, “I’ve got a huge project for you. I’m in the coffee shop right now. What can I get you?” And I mused, something mocha. Even though I have no clue what mocha is. I can’t remember the first time I heard [...]

Sep

5

Word Of The Week: September 5th, 2009.

Posted by Christopher Waldrop

September 5, 2009 | 1 Comment

One of the nice things about working in a library is I’m always running across interesting things. I feel like I’m constantly learning and constantly discovering things I might not have even thought about if I didn’t work in a place where books and periodicals regularly pass through my hands. And sometimes it’ll add to [...]

Aug

8

Word Of The Week: August 8th, 2009

Posted by Christopher Waldrop

August 8, 2009 | 3 Comments

The onomatopoeic quality of certain words, such as gargle or gurgle, seems obvious. And yet what’s not always so obvious is when a word is derived from one of those onomatopoeic words but develops a meaning that’s so radically different from its original intent that the derivation slips into the background. That would be what’s [...]

Jun

19

Get Out Of Your Chair.

Posted by Christopher Waldrop

June 19, 2009 | Leave a Comment

It drives my wife nuts, but I pace when I’m on the phone. I can’t help it. Sometimes I’m not even conscious of it until she yells, “Stop pacing!” from the other room. At work, when I’m on hold, or even if I’m discussing a particularly thorny problem with someone, I’ll pace in my office. This may [...]