Daily Content Archive
(as of Monday, February 28, 2022)| Word of the Day | |||||||
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petulant
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| Daily Grammar Lesson | |
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Using Predicate NounsPredicate nouns are a subset of a larger category known as "subject complements," which rename or re-identify the subject. What type of verb do subject complements follow? More... | |
| Article of the Day | |
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 Messier ObjectsIn 1784, French astronomer Charles Messier compiled a list of non-stellar celestial objects. He had no understanding of what these items—now known to be galaxies, nebulae, and star clusters—actually were; he just wanted to further the search for comets by listing the indistinct objects that might be mistaken for them. Designations from his catalog are still used to refer to some nebulae and star clusters—for instance, M1 is the Crab Nebula and M45 is the Pleiades. What is a "Messier Marathon"? More... | |
| This Day in History | |
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 The 228 Massacre (1947)Following Japan's defeat in World War II, Taiwan was placed under the administrative control of the Republic of China. The transition did not go smoothly. The Taiwanese had been content under Japanese rule and quickly grew to resent the heavy-handed tactics of the Kuomintang. On February 27, 1947, a dispute between a cigarette vendor and authorities escalated the next day into an anti-government uprising that was violently suppressed. How many Taiwanese are thought to have been massacred? More... | |
| Today's Birthday | |
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 Svetlana Alliluyeva (1926)The youngest child of Joseph Stalin, and his only daughter, Svetlana Alliluyeva caused a furor when she defected to the West in the 1960s, leaving behind her two grown children in the process. After becoming a naturalized US citizen, she published two successful memoirs, married, took the name Lana Peters, had a daughter, and divorced. In 1984, she returned to the USSR and renounced her defection, but her resolve soon wavered. How long was it before she left again for the West? More... | |
| Quotation of the Day | |
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 All human actions have one or more of these seven causes: chance, nature, compulsion, habit, reason, passion, and desire.Aristotle (384 BC-322 BC) | |
| Idiom of the Day | |
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one side— Move aside! Get out of the way! (Short for "move to one side.") More... | |
| Today's Holiday | |
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 Kalevala Day (2022)The Kalevala is Finland's national epic poem, researched and transcribed by Dr. Elias Lönnrot. Lönnrot and his assistants traveled throughout the country, asking people to tell them whatever they could remember about the folklore surrounding Kalevala, the "Land of Heroes." On February 28, 1835, after years of research, Lönnrot signed the preface to the first edition of the poem. This event marked a turning point in Finnish literature; up to this point, little had been written in the Finnish language. Lönnrot is honored with parades and concerts on this day. More... | |
| Word Trivia | |
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Today's topic: throwingmissile - First an adjective meaning "suitable for throwing." More... precipitate, precipitation - Precipitate is from Latin praecipitare, "to throw or drive headlong"; precipitation first meant the action of falling or throwing down. More... throw - Its original sense was "twist, turn," as in throwing a pot on a potter's wheel; it is not known how it evolved into "hurl, project." More... gone to pot - Comes from Elizabethan times, when leftover meat was thrown into a big pot for another meal. More... | |