Vocab of the Week

As an exercise for people with languishing lexicons, Aidan Grey started posting five or ten words, later with example sentences, on Fridays to CONLANG.

These are them, edited slightly for content, formatting, and the occasional tpyo.

Yes, I could power up this page, and make it a bulletin board or livejournal or whatever but it's probably better for folks to post translations to CONLANG where they belong, unless there's a lot of demand for something more autonomous.

#1.1: 29 Mar 2002

1. birch (the tree)
2. werewolf / lycanthrope of some variety
3. to save (money)
4. to conquer
5. motif

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#1.2: 5 Apr 2002

This week's exercises brought to you by the indirect relative and the letters F (for forest) and M (for mushroom).

1. forest
The forest is in that direction. (or "over there", said while pointing to it)
2. mushroom (edible)
I like mushrooms very much!
3. to look for something
I often go searching for mushrooms in the forest.
4. to find something after searching for it
She kept the mushroom that I tripped over.
5. base, bottom
At the base of which tree did you find that mushroom?
6. moss
There is no moss on the base of that tree.
7. basket, bag
Put the mushroom in the basket.
8. pine needles, leaves of a conifer
These baskets, the handles of which are made of pine needles, are useful.
9. each
That is the woman to whom I give each of the mushrooms.
10. always
I always go looking for mushrooms is the forest through which we walked today.

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#1.3: 12 Apr 2002

Brought to you by D (for doctor) and possessive pronouns.

1. doctor / healer
She is my doctor.
2. medicine
That is my medicine, and this is yours.
3. ear
She looked in their ears.
4. eye
She looked in (or tested, or...) her (someone else's) eye.
5. friend
Our friends are ill.
6. itch and/or scratch
His scratch (the one on him) is worse than his scratch (the one he caused on someone else unspecified).
7. hurt / pain (the verb ... or not)
Do y'all's heads hurt? / Do you guys have headaches?
8. diagnosis
His diagnosis (that he gave) is that she will get better.
9. cure / heal
His diagnosis (for the disease he has) has a cure.
She will cure my friends.
10. ill
I am not ill anymore.

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#1.4: 19 Apr 2002

Brought to you by S (for Sluggy) and F (for Freelance) and exclamations.

(see http://www.sluggy.com/ it's a very great web-comic, and even has special gold foil episodes! I recommend it to all the twisted out there - this weeks vocab and context sentences will make a lot of sense after reading some of it...)

1. bunny / rabbit
That bunny has a knife!
2. ferret
This is my ferret. She likes to dance!
3. knife
The bunny with the knife is coming for me!
4. alien / foreigner
Does that alien eat people or not?
5. ouch! / ow!
Ouch! The rabbit with the knife cut off my arm!
6. help!
Help! I'm bleeding to death!
7. aaaa! (a scream of terror)
Aaaaa! The rabbit is coming back!
8. aaaargh! (a scream of pain / failure / death)
Aaaargh! It cut off my other arm!
9. grrrr! (an intimidating growl)
Grrrr! I will step on (crush / squish by foot) that rabbit!
10. blood
The rabbit cut off my legs. Look at the pretty pools of blood.

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#1.5: 26 Apr 2002

Brought to you by C (for coffee), the distinction between perfective and habitual past tenses, and intensive adjectives.

1. coffee / bitter drink / culturally distinctive drink
I used to drink coffee.
2. tea / herbal tea
I drank the tea in one gulp.
3. steep / brew
She used to steep the tea for 10 minutes, but she steeped this cup for only 7 minutes.
4. pastry / biscuits / cookies
She had pastry with her coffee once.
She had pastry with her coffee every day.
5. milk
She doesn't take milk in her tea.
6. bitter
The coffee was very bitter today.
The coffee was bitter every day.
7. sweet
He likes his tea too strong and too sweet for us.
8. wired / the feeling obtained after drinking 43 cups of coffee
That guy is wired! He drinks too much coffee.
9. mellow / calm / soothing (of music)
The music they play is too mellow for my taste.
10. street vendor / coffee house / tea bar / the culturally appropriate place to buy a cup of tea or coffee
That street vendor always had the best tea, but then his wife left him.

(note: in #10, it's a habitual past followed by a perfective)

[p.s. In honor of my becoming the manager of the grad student coffee house on campus. Yay!]

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#1.6: 3 May 2002

Brought to you by C (for crafts) and B (for beads) and prep/post-positions.

1. bead (n.)
There are beads all over the place!
2. thread (n.)
I have thread stuck in my teeth.
3. needle
Ow! I sat on a needle!
4. sew (v.)
My sister sewed me to the chair.
5. bead (v.), put beads on something, make something with beads
He beaded a bunny with a knife. He's sick in the head.
6. spill
Dang! I spilled my beads into my coffee!
7. cut
Cut the thread between this spot and that spot, please.
8. shiny
Those beads are shiny. I like shiny things.
9. stitch (n.)
For this stitch, bring the thread through the bead, over the previous bead, under the thread, and back through the bead again.
10. obsessive / obsessed with / obsessing about
Lately, I find my self obsessed with beads.

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#1.7: 10 May 2002

Brought to you by F (for finals) and S (for studying) and comparative constructions.

1. book
That book over there (yonder) is thicker than the one I'm using now.
2. desk
I sat at my desk longer than the day has hours. (i.e. for more than 24 hours)
3. study
I've been studying with better students than I (am).
4. finals / final examinations (also as sg.)
I will do better on the final than him.
5. midterm(s) / midterm examination(s)
I did worse on my midterm for this class than I've ever done before.
6. grade / score / marks
I hope to get higher scores on the final exams than I did on the midterm exams.
7. stress(ed): n. or adj.
I am more stressed than I thought I would be.
8. busy
I have been busier than ever lately.
9. write, compose (a paper, article, etc.)
I have to write 678 papers by Tuesday.
10. research
I have never researched a topic longer than I have researched this one.
(this sentence includes an opportunity for a resumptive verb or proverb, if you have one!)

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#1.8: 17 May 2002

Brought to you by B for bakery and number agreement (or not).

1. bread
I would like 4 loaves of bread, please.
2. flour
This bread is made with 7 cups of flour.
(obviously, convert this to your native measuring system.)
3. glaze (n. or v.)
This delicious-looking loaf is glazed with honey/has a honey glaze.
4. muffin
They have 42 kinds of sweet muffins.
5. bakery
My favorite bakery is 4 streets over.
6. oven
The bakery is very busy - we have to use all 8 ovens constantly.
7. bake
That bread is baked, but those 3 over there are fried.
8. cost / price
How much do those 6 loaves cost?
9. unusual
This is an unusual recipe for bread - it has very little flour!
10. holiday
I want to order 9 holiday loaves. What will the cost be?

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#1.9: 24 May 2002

It's magically delicious!! (adjectives > adverbs and spiritual/magical ideas)

More so than other topics I've presented, this exercise might require significant tweaking on your part....

1. bless
She blessed me softly (i.e. in a soft voice).
2. curse
We cursed them quickly because they wounded us.
3. charm / amulet / talisman / lucky charm
I made a beautifully carved amulet from the bone that I found.
4. sorcerer / wizard / magician / shaman
That sorcerer usually blesses our charms for us.
5. magic (n. or adj.)
This charm was made with magic.
This magically blessed charm is powerful.
6. rite / ritual / ceremony
She curses them every day.
7. chant (n. or v.)
She is a sorceress, and she usually chants magical words.
8. bestow
This charm bestows happiness.
9. amazing
Zaphod says that it is amazingly amazing!
10. prayer
Prayer is powerful magic.

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#1.10: 31 May 2002

Brought to you by A (architecture), D (directions), and subordinate clauses.

1. house
2. wall
3. door
4. threshhold
5. window
6. lock (v. or n.)
7. room
8. bathroom
9. corner
10. ceiling
My house has a door that faces north, but windows that face east and west.
That unusual house has 6 walls per room.
The threshhold is where the door is.
There aren't any locks on the doors, not even on the bathroom door.
In the southern corner, against the ceiling, there are many cobwebs.

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#2.1: 18 Oct 2002

Theme: topicalization (make the vocab word the topic or focus of the utterance).

1. crowd
There was a huge crowd in front of the building.
2. lead
She led her dog into the field.
Her dog was on a lead.
The pipes are made of lead.
3. ready
He's ready to go now.
4. slow
Snails are slow.
He runs slowly, and I bet he won't win the race.
5. rent
I have to pay rent on the 5th of every month.
6. popularity
This was just a popularity contest.
7. -ion
two parts here: first, how are verbal nouns formed?
   act > action, move > motion, see > vision.
second, the sentence:
   His action was hasty.
8. addition
Even the addition of an extra student increased class sizes beyond tolerable limits.
9. hat
Today is a say-something hat day!
10. pack
I need to pack for my trip.
The pack she wore on the trip was way too heavy.

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#2.2: 26 Oct 2002

Correlative pronouns

1. whoever
Whoever stole my wallet is going to die!
2. which
Which one do you like better?
3. scale
What kind of bathroom scale do you have?
How many scales are there on a trout?
Someone scaled the wall silently.
4. throat
My throat hurt, so I guessed I had some kind of infection.
5. set
Every one of the dish sets was chipped.
Everytime he sets the table, he forgets the spoons.
6. slight
Whenever her son has a slight cough, she takes him to the doctor.
7. upstairs
When we play hide-and-seek, sometimes I like to hide upstairs.
8. reduce
He needs to reduce the number of cigarettes he smokes.
9. care
No one cares about him.
10. imagination
I never had the imagination you have.

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#2.3: 8 Nov 2002

Topic: genitive relatives (or whatever the "whose..." clauses are called)

1. president
2. office
The president whose office is oval has moved to the country.
(I swear this juxtaposition was random)
3. trap
The hunter whose trap was empty is angry.
4. operate
He operated on her.
He knows how to operate a well/pump.
5. idea
Whose idea was that?
6. blame
The girl whose dress is torn blames you.
7. descriptive
The guy whose writing is very descriptive will probably win awards.
8. upright
It stood upright against the wall.
9. everything
Everything is as messed up!
10. own
The old woman who owns that cat is really mean.
I can barely see my own hand in front of my face.

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#2.4: 8 Nov 2002

Topic: how to disambiguate (if at all) 3rd person referents

1. life
She owed her her life.
2. journey
Their journey to visit their friends was long.
3. brick
He gave his brick to him.
4. merry
She was merry all day at the festival.
5. fail
He failed to save him.
6. approve
He approved his request.
7. jaw
Their jaws were bruised from fighting their enemies.
8. hardship
He thought his hardship too great to bear.
9. whatever
Whatever she did, she was not happy.
10. goods
Their goods were locked on their wagon.

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#2.5: 17 Nov 2002

Topic: predicate adjectives

1. answer
Her answer was too short.
She answered at length.
2. silence
The silence was uncomfortable.
3. tune
The tune he played was beautiful.
He tuned his [tuneable instrument].
4. camp
Their camp was nearly invisible.
They camped on the butte.
5. blood
Blood is red.
6. lend
She lends her time to anyone who asks.
7. equal
We get equal pay for our work.
8. determination
Her determination was impressive.
9. anger
His anger was frightening.
10. name
Their names are far too long.

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#2.6: 24 Nov 2002

Topic: finite complement clauses

1. me, I
It bothers me that she is late.
2. quick
I hope that Sam is quick.
3. preparation
I think she made a lot of preparations.
4. sum
The sum of these numbers is 42.
I know that she sums quickly.
5. pity
It is a pity that he did that.
6. pipe
Their pipes are dirty.
7. dip
There is a dip in the road here.
I hear she dips her jelly donuts in her tea.
8. outdoor
I saw him outdoors. (adv)
I want to go on an outdoor adventure. (adj)
9. priest
The priest says that she is an honest woman.
10. pretty
I smelled the pretty flowers.

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#2.7: 29 Nov 2002

Topic: non-finite clauses

1. machinery
To repair machinery is difficult.
2. into
Entering into machinery is a serious matter.
3. wicked
She wants to be a wicked woman.
4. mid-
Mid-century, being a wicked woman was dangerous.
5. turn
It's your turn.
He needs to turn around.
6. historical
They want to study historical documents.
7. upset
We are upset about his coming.
8. him
We need to tell him.
9. damage
They are trying to damage our reputation.
It took a lot of damage in the battle.
10. apparatus
This apparatus needs to be repaired.

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#10a: 26 Jan 2003

Topic: negation

1. bathe
He didn't bathe yesterday.
2. narrow
This road isn't that narrow.
3. jealous
I am not jealous!
4. sting
Luckily, the hornet didn't sting me.
5. who
Who wouldn't?
6. grief
She couldn't come to grips with her grief.
7. decrease
The profits have not decreased for 2 years.
8. annoy
You couldn't annoy me if you tried.
9. camera
That is not a camera - it's a calculator.
10. boot
She doesn't like boots.
Don't boot him out!

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#10b: 26 Jan 2003

topic: Up for grabs

1. her
2. poor
3. sexual
4. origin
5. wise
6. cut
7. active
8. among
9. service
10. his

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