arbitrary (adjective|AHR-buh-trair-ee)
Arbitrary describes something that is not planned or chosen for a particular reason, is not based on reason or evidence, or is done without concern for what is fair or right.
// Because the committee wasn’t transparent about the selection process, the results of the process appeared to be wholly arbitrary.
// An arbitrary number will be assigned to each participant.
Did You Know?
Donning black robes and a powdered wig to learn about arbitrary might seem to be an arbitrary—that is, random or capricious—choice, but it would in fact jibe with the word’s etymology. Arbitrary comes from the Latin noun arbiter, which means “judge” and is the source of the English word arbiter, also meaning “judge.” In English, arbitrary first meant “depending upon choice or discretion” and was specifically used to indicate the sort of decision (as for punishment) left up to the expert determination of a judge rather than defined by law. Today, it can also be used for anything determined by or as if by chance or whim.
fidelity (noun|fuh-DELL-uh-tee)
Fidelity is the quality or state of being faithful to a person, such as a partner or spouse, or a thing, such as one’s country. Fidelity can also refer to accuracy or exactness in details, or the degree to which an electronic device (such as a television) accurately reproduces its effect (such as sound or picture).
// After almost three decades on the job, no one can doubt their fidelity to the company.
// The movie’s director insisted on total fidelity to the book.
Fidelity came to English by way of Middle French in the 15th century, and can ultimately be traced back to the Latin adjective fidēlis, meaning “faithful, loyal, trustworthy.” While fidelity was originally exclusively about loyalty, it has for centuries also been used to refer to accuracy, as in “questions about the fidelity of the translation.” Nowadays fidelity is often used in reference to recording and broadcast devices, conveying the idea that a broadcast or recording is “faithful” to the live sound or picture that it reproduces.
Tuesday November 4 2025
spontaneous (adjective|spahn-TAY-nee-us)
Spontaneous describes something that is done or said in a natural and often sudden way and without a lot of thought or planning. It can describe a person who does things that have not been planned but that seem enjoyable and worth doing at a particular time.
// The kitten captured our hearts, and we made the spontaneous decision to adopt.
// He's a fun and spontaneous guy, always ready for the next big adventure.
When English philosopher Thomas Hobbes penned his 1654 treatise Of Libertie and Necessitie he included the following: "all voluntary actions … are called also spontaneous, and said to be done by a man's own accord." Hobbes was writing in English, but he knew Latin perfectly well too, including the source of spontaneous; the word comes (via Late Latin spontāneus, meaning "voluntary, unconstrained") from the Latin sponte, meaning "of one's free will, voluntarily." In modern use, the word spontaneous is frequently heard in more mundane settings, where it often describes what is done or said without a lot of thought or planning.
lout (noun|LOUT)
What It Means
A lout is an awkward brutish person.
// It was difficult for us to focus on the movie due to the noise coming from the group of louts seated in front of us.
Lout belongs to a large group of words that we use to indicate a particular sort of offensive and insensitive person, that group also including such terms as boor, oaf, jerk, and churl. English speakers have used lout in this way since the mid-1500s. Well before the 12th century, however, lout functioned as a verb with the meaning “to bow in respect.” No one is quite sure how—or even if—the verb sense developed into a noun meaning “an awkward brutish person.” The noun could have been coined independently, but if its source was the verb, perhaps the awkward posture of one bowing down led over the centuries to the idea that the bowing person was base and awkward as well.
conciliatory (adjective|kun-SILL-yuh-tor-ee)
Something described as conciliatory is intended to reduce hostility or to gain favor or goodwill.
// As the customer’s voice rose, the manager adopted a soothing, conciliatory tone and promised that the situation would be remedied.
If you are conciliatory toward someone, you’re trying to win that person over to your side, usually by making them less angry. The verb conciliate was borrowed into English in the mid-16th century and descends from the Latin verb conciliare, meaning “to assemble, unite, or win over.” Conciliare, in turn, comes from the noun concilium, meaning “assembly” or “council.” Conciliatory, which appeared in English a bit later in the 16th century, also traces back to conciliare, and is used especially to describe things like tones, gestures, and approaches intended to turn someone’s frown upside down. Another word that has conciliare as a root is reconcile, the earliest meaning of which is “to restore to friendship or harmony.”
vamoose (verb|vuh-MOOSS)
Vamoose is an informal word that means "to depart quickly."
// With the sheriff hot on their tails, the bank robbers knew they had better vamoose.
In the 1820s and '30s, the American Southwest was rough-and-tumble territory—the true Wild West. English-speaking cowboys, Texas Rangers, and gold prospectors regularly rubbed elbows with Spanish-speaking vaqueros in the local saloons, and a certain amount of linguistic intermixing was inevitable. One Spanish term that caught on with English speakers was vamos, which means "let's go." Cowpokes and dudes alike adopted the word, at first using a range of spellings and pronunciations that varied considerably in their proximity to the original Spanish form. But when the dust settled, the version most American English speakers were using was vamoose.
Vamoose is a species of moose seen frequently around Virginia Beach and Norfolk. They are small and prefer saltwater.
😂
Saturday November 8, 2025
bromide (noun|BROH-myde)
A bromide is a statement intended to make someone feel happier or calmer, but too dull and unoriginal to be effective.
// Their speech had nothing more to offer than the usual bromides about how everyone needs to work together.
A bromide is a statement so worn and trite as to be ineffective when it’s offered to make someone feel better. Before the sigh-inducing type, though, bromides were most familiar in compounds like potassium bromide, used in the late 19th century as a sedative to treat everything from epilepsy to sleeplessness. (The chemical element bromine had been discovered in 1826.) Such compounds fell from use with the invention of barbiturates in the early 20th century, around the same time that the word bromide started to be applied to anything or anyone dull enough to make one drowsy.
improvident (adjective | im-PRAH-vuh-dunt)
Improvident is a formal word used to describe something that does not foresee or provide for the future, especially with regard to money. An improvident relationship, habit, or practice is financially unwise or impractical.
// The directors were blasted at the committee hearing for their improvident use of public money.
Did you know?
Improvident describes someone’s actions or habits as being unwise with regard to saving or providing for the future. It’s a formal word, but the behavior it describes is well illustrated by many of the stories people hear or read as children, including some of the world’s oldest. In Aesop’s fable “The Ant and the Grasshopper,” the grasshopper could certainly be called improvident—he spends all summer singing and dancing while the ant works hard to prepare for winter by storing food, and at the end of the short tale is cold and starving. While today improvident is used mostly in the context of money, and those who are irresponsible with it, one can be improvident with other things (such as time or food), even happily. In another children’s tale, The Tale of the Flopsy Bunnies, author Beatrix Potter introduces the titular family of bunnies, sleepy from eating too much lettuce, as follows: “they were very improvident and cheerful.”
temerity (noun|tuh-MAIR-uh-tee)
Temerity is the quality of being confident and unafraid of danger or punishment, especially in a way that seems rude or foolish. Temerity may also refer to a rash or reckless act.
// She had the temerity to ask me for another loan when she had yet to begin repaying the first one.
// The students somehow convinced the principal that a prank of such temerity warranted only three days' detention.
When you're feeling saucy, there's no shortage of words in the English language you can use to describe the particular flavor of your metaphorical sauce, from audacity and effrontery to the Yiddish-derived fan favorite chutzpah. If we may be so bold, let us also suggest temerity: it comes from the Latin temere, meaning "recklessly" or "haphazardly," and is good for suggesting boldness even in the face of danger or likely punishment. Temerity is a formal word, rarely used in casual writing or conversation, but provided you have the cheek to flout this convention, you may be thinking "what have I got to lose?"
doughty (adjective|DOW-tee)
Doughty is a word with an old-fashioned flair used to describe someone who is brave, strong, and determined.
// The monument celebrates the doughty townspeople who fended off invaders centuries ago.
There’s no doubt that doughty has persevered in the English language—it’s traceable all the way back to the Old English word dohtig—but how to pronounce it? One might assume that doughty should be pronounced \DAW-tee\, paralleling similarly spelled words like bought and sought, or perhaps with a long o, as in dough. But the vowel sound in doughty is the same as in doubt, and in fact, over the centuries, doughty’s spelling was sometimes confused with that of the now obsolete word doubty (“full of doubt”), which could be the reason we have the pronunciation we use today. The homophonous dowdy (“having a dull or uninteresting appearance”) can also be a source of confusion; an easy way to remember the difference is that you can’t spell doughty without the letters in tough (“physically and emotionally strong”).
abide (verb|uh-BYDE)
If someone cannot abide someone or something bad, unpleasant, etc., they cannot tolerate or accept that person or thing. Abide can also mean "to accept without objection" and "to remain or continue."
// I just can't abide such blatant dishonesty.
// Residents agree to abide by the dorm's rules.
Abide has abided in the English language since before the 12th century, picking up along the way several meanings and inflections that are now rare or no longer in use. For instance, one of abide's former meanings was "to stop" and its former past participle was abidden (whereas we now use abided or abode). Today, abide often turns up in the phrase "can't abide" to say that someone cannot tolerate or accept something. The expression abide by, which means "to accept and be guided by (something)," is also common. Related terms include abiding, meaning "continuing for a long time" or "not changing" (as in "an abiding friendship"), abidance ("continuance" or "the act or process of doing what you have been asked or ordered to do"), and abode ("the place where someone lives").
November 13, 2025 peremptory (adjective|puh-REMP-tuh-ree)
Peremptory is a formal word used especially in legal contexts to describe an order, command, etc., that requires immediate compliance with no opportunity to show why one should not comply. It is also used disapprovingly to describe someone with an arrogant attitude, or something indicative of such an attitude.
// The soldiers were given a peremptory order to abandon the mission.
// The company’s president tends to adopt a peremptory manner especially at the negotiating table.
Peremptory comes from the Latin verb perimere, meaning “to take entirely” or “to destroy,” which in turn combines the prefix per- (“throughout” or “thoroughly”) and the verb emere (“to take”). Peremptory implies the removal of one’s option to disagree or contest something, and sometimes suggests an abrupt dictatorial manner combined with an unwillingness to tolerate disobedience or dissent, as in “employees given a peremptory dismissal.” Not to sound peremptory ourselves, but don’t confuse peremptory with the similar-sounding (and related) adjective preemptive, meaning “marked by the seizing of the initiative,” as in “a preemptive attack.”
November 14, 2025
heyday (noun|HAY-day)
Heyday refers to the period of one's greatest popularity, vigor, or prosperity. It is usually used in the singular.
// In its heyday, the circus was a major form of entertainment for the small town.
The day in heyday originally had nothing to do with the kind of day that's made up of 24 hours. Heyday was first used in the first half of the 16th century as an extended form of the interjection hey, used since the 13th century to express elation or wonder, as it still often is in phrases like "hey, look at that!" The day part was most likely just an extra syllable tagged on for effect. By the end of the 16th century heyday had developed noun use with the meaning "high spirits," as when Shakespeare's Hamlet tells his mother, "You cannot call it love; for at your age / The heyday in the blood is tame …” It wasn't until the 18th century that the day syllable's resemblance to the word day likely influenced the development of the now-familiar use referring to the period when one's achievement or popularity has reached its zenith.
radial (adjective|RAY-dee-ul)
Radial describes things that are arranged or have parts arranged in straight lines coming out from the center of a circle.
// Her mosaics echo radial patterns observed in nature, from succulents to sea urchins.
Picture the sun shining brightly on a cloudless day. Its rays stretch in every direction along radiant radii so far-reaching they radiate daylight. It's pretty rad, and it's a cinch to describe in English thanks to the expansive influence of the Latin noun radius, meaning "ray." As you might have guessed, radius is an ancestor of the English words ray, radiant, radiate, and of course radius. It's also the sunny source of radial, which joined our language in the 1500s as an adjective meaning "arranged or having parts arranged like rays." Radial has bourgeoned in meaning over the centuries, adopting unique applications across many fields including medicine, engineering, and astronomy.