Daily Content Archive
(as of Monday, December 14, 2015)| Word of the Day | |||||||
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pellucid
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| Daily Grammar Lesson | |
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Indefinite Pronouns: People vs. ThingsBoth people and things can be identified in a sentence by an indefinite pronoun. Indefinite pronouns like "anyone," "everybody," "no one," and "someone" are only used to refer to people. What are some indefinite pronouns that are only used to refer to things? More... | |
| Article of the Day | |
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 KÀ and the Circus of the SunWhen two former street performers founded Cirque du Soleil in 1984, they began a movement that would revolutionize the concept of the modern circus. KÀ, Cirque's fourth resident show in Las Vegas, premiered in 2004 at the MGM Grand. The unique, Vegas style production is a multimedia, acrobatic, orchestral undertaking about conflict, love, and self discovery. KÀ lacks a traditional stage and is instead performed on floating platforms that rotate and move. What is the KÀ encountered in this show? More... | |
| This Day in History | |
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 First Group of Explorers Reaches South Pole (1911)Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen had been planning for a trip to the North Pole until he heard that someone had beaten him to it. Instead, he and his team set sail for Antarctica. There, they spent nearly a year preparing for the final two-month trek that made them the first people to reach the South Pole. With good equipment and plenty of sled dogs, the team was extremely well prepared compared to other polar expeditions of the day, some of which ended badly. How was their clothing better? More... | |
| Today's Birthday | |
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 Margaret Chase Smith (1897)Smith served as her husband's secretary following his election as a US representative. After he died in 1940, she was elected to finish his unexpired term, becoming Maine's first congresswoman. Noted for her integrity and independence, she joined the Senate in 1948 and continued to be reelected until 1972. In 1950, she gave her famed "Declaration of Conscience" speech opposing the actions of Senator Joseph McCarthy. The speech earned her what derisive nickname from McCarthy's staff? More... | |
| Quotation of the Day | |
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 In museums and palaces we are alternate radicals and conservatives.Henry James (1843-1916) | |
| Idiom of the Day | |
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in the wild— In naturally occurring conditions or environments. More... | |
| Today's Holiday | |
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.jpg) Halcyon Days (2020)The ancient Greeks called the seven days preceding and the seven days following the Winter Solstice the "Halcyon Days." Greek mythology has it that Halcyone (or Alcyone), Ceyx's wife and one of Aeolus's daughters, drowned herself when she learned her husband had drowned. The gods took pity on her and transformed them both into kingfishers. Zeus commanded the seas to be still during these days, and it was considered a period when sailors could navigate in safety. Today, the expression "halcyon days" has come to mean a period of tranquility, often used as a nostalgic reference to times past. More... | |
| Word Trivia | |
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Today's topic: noonhigh noon - Exactly 12 noon. More... luncheon - An extension of the word lunch, based on nuncheon, "a drink taken at noon." More... noon - Derived from the Latin word nona, "ninth," as it originally meant the ninth hour after sunrise, about 3 p.m. More... post meridiem - The expansion of p.m., from Latin, meaning "after noon" (1647). More... | |