Vocabulary Builder

Front 1

dilatory

Back 1

dilatory

adjective:

1. Tending to put off what ought to be done at once; given to procrastination.

2. Marked by procrastination or delay; intended to cause delay; -- said of actions or measures.

I am inclined to be dilatory, and if I had not enjoyed extraordinary luck in life and love I might have been living with my mother at that very moment, doing nothing.
--Carroll O'Connor


And what is a slumlord? He is not a man who own expensive property in fashionable neighborhoods, but one who owns only rundown property in the slums, where the rents are lowest and the where the payment is most dilatory, erratic and undependable.
--Henry Hazlitt

Front 2

numinous

Back 2

numinous
\\\\NOO-min-uhs; NYOO-\\\\,

adjective:
1. Of or pertaining to a numen; supernatural.

2. Indicating or suggesting the presence of a god; divine; holy.

3. Inspiring awe and reverence; spiritual.

Smoking is a ritual, and it has all the numinous force of a ritual.
--Thomas W. Laqueur,


All Quests are concerned with some numinous Object, the Waters of Life, the Grail, buried treasure, etc.
--W. H. Auden, "Secular Hobbitism"


Our culture is not much concerned with the numinous, but in language we preserve many of the marks of a culture that is.
--Richard Mitchell


My sense of the numinous is generally keenest upstate, in the fields and forest that surround my old schoolhouse.
--Winifred Gallagher


Numinous is from Latin numen, literally a "nod of the head" (as in giving a command), hence "divine power."

Front 3

enmity

Back 3

enmity
\\\\EN-mih-tee\\\\, noun:

Hatred; ill will; hostile or unfriendly disposition.


I learned, of course,... that the flames of infatuation can quickly become ashes of enmity and contempt.
--Kathleen Norris, [1]The Virgin of Bennington


In the course of our conversation he reverted to yesterday's aphorism about it being our joint task to guide our two peoples out of their old enmity into new amity.
--Charles Kessler (editor and translator), [2]Berlin in Lights


There were also always those I rubbed the wrong way (sometimes to the point of outright enmity) by being too brash or too arrogant or too ambitious or too precociously successful -- or by not being inhibited or tactful enough to refrain from writing about my career.
--Norman Podhoretz, [3]Ex-Friends


Enmity derives from Old French enemistié, ultimately from Latin inimicus, "an enemy," from in-, "not" + amicus, "friend," from amare, "to love."


Synonyms: animosity, antipathy, hostility, rancor

Front 4

pari passu

Back 4

pari passu
PAIR-ih-PASS-oo\\, adverb:

At an equal pace or rate.


Expand the state and [its] destructive capacity necessarily expands too, pari passu.
--Paul Johnson, [1]Modern Times: The World From the Twenties to the Eighties


Independent hedge funds can sell their holdings in a stock all at once, but if a hedge fund is part of a mutual fund company, it generally must sell pari passu... with the company's mutual funds that hold the same stock, constraining flexibility.
--Geraldine Fabrikant, "Should You Bristle at These Hedges?" [2]New York Times, November 8, 1998


Pari passu literally means "with equal step," from Latin pari, ablative of par, "equal" + passu, ablative of passus, "step."

Front 5

tryst

Back 5

tryst
\\TRIST; TRYST\\, noun:

An appointment (as between lovers) to meet; also, an appointed place or time of meeting.


intransitive verb:
To mutually agree to meet at a certain place; to keep a tryst.


And it bothers me that I begin to worry if she's planning a tryst with my handsome neighbour.
--Anita Nair, [1]The Better Man


Having left a "[2]Dear John" letter for her husband on the kitchen table, she set off to the airport, where she waited, and waited. Of course, Henry had entirely forgotten about the tryst, and she had to return home crestfallen.
--"The serial seducer who took Amis's wife," [3]Times (London), May 17, 2000


Once Nick goes into the kitchen to tryst with Martha, it is Ms. Kurtz's turn to let loose with some fireworks.
--Frank Rich, [4]Hot Seat


Scientists are hoping the cosmos will bear witness to a romantic rendezvous today as a spacecraft attempts a Valentine's Day "tryst" with an asteroid called Eros.
--Nigel Hawkes, "Eros beckons spacecraft for cosmic tryst," [5]Times (London), February 14, 2000


Tryst is from Middle English triste, tryste, "a station to which game was driven (in hunting)," from Old French triste, "a station to which game was driven, a watch post," probably of Scandinavian origin.

Front 6

ubiquitous

Back 6

ubiquitous
\\yoo-BIK-wih-tuhs\\,

adjective:
Existing or being everywhere, or in all places, at the same time.


In spite of the ubiquitous beggars, gypsies and 'naked urchins', Skopje was an attractive town in the early part of the century.
--Anne Sebba, [1]Mother Teresa: Beyond the Image


Airborne gambling, shopping and videoconferencing may all be ubiquitous in the future.
--Peter H. Lewis, "The Cybercompanion," [2]New York Times, February 7, 1999


Adding to my perplexity, this lack of clarity even appeared evident among the best and brightest sociologists, historians, literary scholars, art historians, those working in cultural studies, American Studies, and journalism; the problem looked to be ubiquitous.
--Michael Kammen, [3]American Culture, American Tastes


Before Tarzan, nobody understood just how big, how ubiquitous, how marketable a star could be.
--John Taliaferro, [4]Tarzan Forever


Ubiquitous derives, via French, from Latin ubique, "everywhere," from ubi, "where." The noun form is ubiquity.

Front 7

stertorous

Back 7

pronunciation: stir-to-rus

characterized by a harsh snoring or gasping sound

Example: Personnel from emergency medical services found him lying supine on the ground, unconscious, with stertorous respirations.

Front 8

supernal

Back 8

supernal

adjective

chiefly poetic/literary, of or relating to the sky or the heavens; celestial.

• of exceptional quality or extent : he is the supernal poet of our age