Jun 19, 2005

Postprandial

Done, made, taken, happening, etc. after dinner; after-dinner. (Chiefly humorous.)

Hence post"prandially adv., after dinner.

Fulminate

I. In physical senses.

1. intr. To thunder and lighten. rare.

2. To issue as a thunderbolt.

†3. Metallurgy. Of gold: To become suddenly bright and uniform in colour. Obs.

†4. trans. To strike with lightning. Obs. rare.

5. To flash forth like lightning.

6. †a. trans. To cause to explode with sudden loud report (? obs.). b. intr. To explode with a loud report, detonate, go off.

II. fig.
[Originally a rendering of med.L. fulminare, the technical term for the formal issuing of condemnations or censures by the pope or other ecclesiastical authority; afterwards used with wider application and with reference to the literal sense.]

7. trans. To ‘thunder forth’; to utter or publish (a formal condemnation or censure) upon a person.

8. To strike with the ‘thunderbolts’ of ecclesiastical censure; hence gen. to denounce in scathing terms, condemn vehemently.

9. intr. Of the pope, etc.: To issue censures or condemnations (against); gen. to ‘thunder’, inveigh violently against.

10. Path. Of a disease: to develop suddenly and severely. (Cf. fulminating ppl. a. 3.)

Hence "fulminating vbl. n., the action of the vb.

Osculate

1. trans. To kiss, salute with contact of the lips; intr. to kiss each other. rare.

2. trans. To bring into close contact or union.

3. intr. To come into close contact or union; to have close contact with each other, to come together. In Nat. Hist. To have contact through an intermediate species or genus (cf. osculant).

4. Math. trans. To have contact of a higher order with, esp. the highest contact possible for two loci; to have three or more coincident points in common with; intr. (for refl.) to osculate each other: as two curves, two surfaces, or a surface and a curve.

Hence "osculating ppl. a., usually in sense 4, as osculating circle, curve, plane, sphere.

Scumble

1. a. trans. In Oil Painting. To soften or render less brilliant (the colours in a portion of a picture) by overlaying with a thin coat of opaque or semi-opaque colour; to spread or ‘drive’ (a colour) thinly over a portion of a picture in order to soften hard lines or blend the tints; to produce (an effect) by this process. b. absol.

2. In Pencil, Chalk, or Monochrome Drawing. (See quots.)

3. transf. of natural effects.

Hence "scumbled ppl. a., "scumbling vbl. n.

Vagary

1. †a. A wandering or devious journey or tour; a roaming about or abroad; an excursion, ramble, stroll. Obs.
Freq. in the 17th c., chiefly in verbal phrases as to fetch, make, or take a vagary.

†b. to play his vagary, of a horse, to leave or refuse to follow the proper or desired course. Obs.—1

c. An irregular course or distribution.

†2. A wandering in speech or writing; a rambling from the subject under consideration; a digression or divagation. Obs. (passing into sense 5).

3. a. A departure or straying from the ordered, regular, or usual course of conduct, decorum, or propriety; a frolic or prank, esp. one of a freakish nature. Now rare or Obs. (passing into sense 4).

†b. Without article: Frolic, gambolling. Obs.

4. a. A capricious, fantastic, or eccentric action or piece of conduct.


I'm pretty sure I left Coda a voicemail the day before his birthday or the day after, but he never called me back. Not that it bothers me when Coda doesn't call me back. We've had some lively email exchanges but our phone conversations have generally been one-off affairs, not really part of an ongoing dialogue or anything. Not that I have a leg to stand on the returning of phone calls tip; I'm at +5 for outgoing calls made vs. return calls made (meaning there's three people I'm supposed to call and eight people who are supposed to call me, applying somewhat subjective and arbitrary rules of etiquette) but if you consider email correspondence roughly equivalent to returning a phone call, which I do, then I'm at -8, unless you count friendster testimonials, which I don't, in which case I'd be at -13 for the year.

Coda did call me back, though, even if it took him a couple months. I'd run into him on IM and demanded to know where the hell he'd been. "Falling in love," he said somewhat cryptically, as if that means anything at all to me.