Daily Content Archive
(as of Wednesday, June 29, 2016)| Word of the Day | |||||||
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dyspepsia
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| Daily Grammar Lesson | |
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Adverbial PhrasesAn adverbial phrase (also known as an adverb phrase) is group of words that functions as an adverb in a sentence. What is a mitigator? More... | |
| Article of the Day | |
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 The Disappearance of the Mona LisaThe world's most famous case of art theft—the removal of the Mona Lisa from the Louvre in 1911—was solved when museum employee Vincenzo Peruggia tried to sell the painting to a gallery in Italy. He had kept the masterpiece in his apartment for two years after having simply walked out of the museum with it hidden under his coat. What famous painter—some of whose own sketches would be stolen more than 50 years later—was questioned before Peruggia was caught? More... | |
| This Day in History | |
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 Two Car Bombs Discovered in London (2007)In 2007, a potential tragedy was averted in London when two car bombs were disabled before they could be detonated in a busy district of the city. The cars and devices were recovered intact for forensic examination and both were found to contain gasoline canisters, nails, and a mobile phone-based trigger. The next day, two men drove a car laden with propane into a terminal at Glasgow International Airport and set it ablaze. The surviving conspirator was jailed for both incidents. Who was he? More... | |
| Today's Birthday | |
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 Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis (1893)Mahalanobis was an Indian scientist and applied statistician. He is best remembered for the Mahalanobis distance, a statistical measure he used in his pioneering studies in anthropometry—the study of human body measurement for use in anthropological classification and comparison. He founded the Indian Statistical Institute and contributed to the design of large scale sample surveys. His survey methods have been used to study things like tea-drinking habits, crop acreage, and what else? More... | |
| Quotation of the Day | |
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 There was an immeasurable distance between the quick and the dead: they did not seem to belong to the same species; and it was strange to think that but a little while before they had spoken and moved and eaten and laughed.W. Somerset Maugham (1874-1965) | |
| Idiom of the Day | |
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drop (one) a line— To contact someone, usually with a letter, note, or phone call. More... | |
| Today's Holiday | |
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 Mnarja (2018)Mnarja is the principal folk festival of Malta and a public holiday there, thought to have been originally a harvest festival. It is held in Buskett Gardens, a park with extensive vineyards and orange and lemon orchards not far from Mdina, Malta's medieval capital. Festivities begin on the eve of Mnarja with an agricultural show that continues through the next morning and folk-singing and folk-music competitions. The traditional food of the evening is fried rabbit. On the following day, bareback horse and donkey races bring the feast to an end. More... | |
| Word Trivia | |
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Today's topic: sacksachet - Etymologically, a "little sack"—a small packet of perfumed matter. More... cul-de-sac - Literally French for "bottom of a sack," it also means "situation from which there is no escape"; it can be pluralized as cul-de-sacs or culs-de-sac. More... gunny - From Sanskrit goni, "sack," it is the material used for sacks, made from jute or sunn-hemp. More... haversack, knapsack, rucksack - Haversack is from German Haber, "oats," and Sack, "bag, sack"; knapsack is from German knapper, "to bite (food)" and zak, "sack"; rucksack comes from German Rucken, "back," and sack. More... | |