Author: Marion Deeds

This week’s Word for Wednesday: “Scobberlotcher,” a noun, means an idler, a slacker or lazy person. The first documented example of it in writing is in 1697, in one of historian John Aubrey’s Brief Lives  books. Writing of a university dean, Aubrey said that many students at the university were scobberlotchers who drank and wandered about and “telling the numbers of trees.”

I wonder if “scobberlotch” could be a verb.

Nobel Prize for Literature

Svetlana Alexievich won the Nobel Prize for Literature. She is best known for her book on Chernobyl,

On this date in 1714, residents of the Netherlands city of Alkmaar took to the street in a full-blown riot. What caused their outrage? The city fathers had attempted to levy a tax on beer. Don’t mess with the beer, people.

Legacies:

Sir Terry Pratchett’s estate announced a $1 million Australian endowment for the University of South Australia. The scholarship will be awarded every two years. It will pay two years’ worth of expenses for the student, and provides $100,000 to that student for an additional year of study at the UniSA or at Trinity College,

This week’s Word for Wednesday is sesquipedalian, an adjective used to describe a word with many syllables. The origin is Latin, from the word for “foot and a half.” “Sesquipedalian” appeared in usage in the early 1600s.  My Oxford English Dictionary gives the first written use of the word in 1625 if I am reading the tiny print correctly.

Birthdays and Anniversaries:

A happy birthday to Mark Hamil, Shel Silverstien and Christopher Reeve who all share the same birthday, September 25.

The Planetary Society will have its 35th anniversary party on Saturday,