Daily Content Archive
(as of Tuesday, July 23, 2019)| Word of the Day | |||||||
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heliotherapy
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| Daily Grammar Lesson | |
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Participle Phrases in Initial PositionWhere a participle phrase appears in a sentence changes the way we punctuate it, as does its importance to the meaning of the sentence as a whole. When a participle phrase occurs in the initial position, how is it usually separated from the rest of the sentence? More... | |
| Article of the Day | |
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 John DowlandDowland was an English composer who was unsurpassed in his day as a lutenist. Refused a court position in 1594 and believing his adoptive Catholicism to have been the cause, he left for the Continent and took a position at the Danish court. Having made a name for himself in the music world, he was finally appointed lutenist to the English court in 1612. He published three collections of songs, including about 90 works for solo lute and some 80 lute songs. Why do some suspect that he was a spy? More... | |
| This Day in History | |
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 The "Gimli Glider": Air Canada Flight Runs Out of Fuel Mid-Flight (1983)The "Gimli Glider" is the nickname given to Air Canada Flight 143, which ran out of fuel on a routine flight from Montreal to Edmonton in 1983. The crew was able to glide the aircraft safely to an emergency landing at a retired airstrip in Gimli, Manitoba, even through part of the runway had been converted into a racetrack and a large event was being held there at the time. Amazingly, no passengers or bystanders suffered any serious injuries. Why did the plane run out of fuel? More... | |
| Today's Birthday | |
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 Judit Polgár (1976)Polgár is a Hungarian chess grandmaster and by far the strongest female chess player in history. A prodigy from an early age, she won many youth tournaments competing against boys. In 1991, at the age of 15, Polgár became the youngest grandmaster in history at the time, earning the distinction faster than Bobby Fischer and Garry Kasparov. She later became the first woman to be ranked in the top ten in the world, ranking as high as eighth. What world champions has Polgár defeated? More... | |
| Quotation of the Day | |
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 One cannot find peace in work or in pleasure, in the world or in a convent, but only in one's soul.W. Somerset Maugham (1874-1965) | |
| Idiom of the Day | |
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riffraff— Undesirable, disreputable, or vulgar people, often used in a condescending manner. More... | |
| Today's Holiday | |
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 Birthday of Guru Har Krishan (2019)Har Krishan (1656-64) was the eighth of the ten Sikh gurus or prophets on whose teaching the religion is based. He is often referred to as the "Child Guru" because he was only five years old when he succeeded his father, Guru Har Rai, who died in 1661. Har Krishan himself died of smallpox at the age of eight, so he remained a child throughout his brief time as guru. The anniversary of his birth is celebrated by Sikhs around the world with special services in the gurdwaras (houses of worship) and with readings from the Guru Granth Sahib, the Sikh scriptures. More... | |
| Word Trivia | |
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Today's topic: seasoningaioli - French for ai, "garlic," and oli, "oil"—mayonnaise seasoned with garlic. More... drawn butter - Melted, clarified, and seasoned. More... herbes de Provence - A blend of herbs used for seasoning, such as basil, bay leaf, chervil, fennel, lavender, marjoram, oregano, rosemary, sage, summer savory, tarragon, and thyme. More... herb, spice, seasoning - Herbs are, technically, plants with aerial parts used for seasoning foods, and a spice (also called seasoning) is any substance used for seasoning foods; many herbs are used as spices, but not all. More... | |