Daily Content Archive
(as of Sunday, October 22, 2017)| Word of the Day | |||||||
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unlettered
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| Daily Grammar Lesson | |
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Order of AdjectivesIn English, the order of adjectives can sometimes be flexible, but most of the time we use a very specific order. To avoid unnatural-sounding sentences, what types of adjectives are used first? More... | |
| Article of the Day | |
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 MondegreensA mondegreen is a series of words that result from the mishearing of a statement or lyric, creating an often humorous new meaning for the original phrase. Perhaps one of the most famous mondegreens is the misinterpretation of the line "there's a bad moon on the rise" in Creedence Clearwater Revival's song "Bad Moon Rising" as "there's a bathroom on the right." The word "mondegreen" was coined in 1954 by writer Sylvia Wright and is itself a mondegreen. From what misheard phrase did it originate? More... | |
| This Day in History | |
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 The Metropolitan Opera House Opens with a Performance of Faust (1883)New York City's Metropolitan Opera House is the leading US opera company. It opened in 1883 after having been founded by a group of millionaires who had failed to get boxes at the prestigious and exclusive Academy of Music. The "Met" soon outshined its rival and is now considered one of the world's premier opera stages. Originally located at Broadway and 39th Street, it moved into the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in 1966. Who were among the Met's founding millionaires? More... | |
| Today's Birthday | |
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%2c_Sarah-Benhardt.jpg) Sarah Bernhardt (1844)The illegitimate child of a courtesan, Bernhardt was encouraged to pursue a theatrical career by one of her mother's lovers. Her acting teachers did not consider her a particularly promising student, but they turned out to be sorely mistaken; Bernhardt went on to become the premier romantic and tragic actress of her day, touring all over the world during her six-decade career on stage and screen. What morbid possession may have helped "the Divine Sarah" reach her potential as a tragedienne? More... | |
| Quotation of the Day | |
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 Two friends, two bodies with one soul inspired.Homer (900 BC-800 BC) | |
| Idiom of the Day | |
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(someone's) hands are full— Someone is too busy or has too much going on to be able to do or become involved with anything else. More... | |
| Today's Holiday | |
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 Hi Matsuri (2021)On the evening of October 22, people light bonfires along the narrow street leading to the Kuramadera Shrine in Kurama, a village in the mountains north of Kyoto, Japan. Fire is a purifying element according to Shinto teachings, and the village is believed to be protected from accidents on this night. Soon after dusk, torches are lit. Even babies are allowed to carry tiny torches made of twigs, while young men carry torches so large it sometimes takes several men to keep them upright. Everyone chants "Sai-rei! Sai-ryo!" ("Festival, good festival!") as they walk through the streets. More... | |
| Word Trivia | |
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Today's topic: swordsheath - Seems to have first been a split stick that a sword could be inserted into. More... spades - As a suit in a deck of cards, it has nothing to do with spades as tools, but comes from Spanish espada, "sword." More... spay - A shortening of a French word espeer, meaning "cut with a sword." More... gladiator, gladiate - The main Latin word for sword was gladius, from which came gladiator; gladiate is an adjective meaning sword-shaped. More... | |