Daily Content Archive
(as of Tuesday, September 5, 2017)| Word of the Day | |||||||
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pestilential
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| Daily Grammar Lesson | |
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Intensifiers vs. MitigatorsIntensifiers are the opposite of mitigators, which are used to decrease the intensity of the words they modify. What is the mitigator in the following sentence? "After eating dinner, everyone in the room was a little bit full." More... | |
| Article of the Day | |
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 Naked Short SellingIn finance, short selling is a way to profit from the decline in the price of a security by borrowing shares, selling them, buying them back at a lower price, and keeping the difference. The controversial process of naked short selling involves the same steps—except the investor does not first borrow the shares or even determine whether the shares can be borrowed. Critics of the practice say it can be used to manipulate and drive down a stock's price. Is naked short selling legal? More... | |
| This Day in History | |
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 Sam Houston Elected First President of Texas (1836)A teenage runaway who spent three years living with Cherokee Indians, Houston went on to serve in the War of 1812 and was elected to the House of Representatives in 1823. Attracted to the struggle for Texan independence, he led the army of the provisional government of Texas to victory against the Mexicans in 1836 and served as the newly independent Republic of Texas's first president. He helped Texas win statehood in 1845 and became governor in 1859, but he was deposed in 1861 for what reason? More... | |
| Today's Birthday | |
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 John Cage (1912)Cage was an American avant-garde composer and writer. In the 1930s, he began writing all-percussion pieces and proclaimed the use of noise as the next musical horizon. In 1938, he introduced the "prepared piano," an instrument whose sound is radically modified by various objects placed on the strings. He developed the idea of indeterminacy, music that is not strictly controlled. The notorious 4'33", probably his most famous piece, consists of 4 minutes and 33 seconds of what? More... | |
| Quotation of the Day | |
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 The soldier who executes what his captain orders does no less than the captain himself who gives the order.Miguel de Cervantes (1547-1616) | |
| Idiom of the Day | |
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bucket list— A list of accomplishments or tasks one hopes to do or achieve before one dies. "Bucket" here is taken from the phrase "kick the bucket," meaning to die. More... | |
| Today's Holiday | |
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 Århus Festival (2018)Since 1965 the Danish city of Århus has been the site of a nine-day festival, whose cultural and sporting events run the gamut from opera to fishing competitions. Queen Margrethe II traditionally gives the opening speech, followed by a performance by the Danish National Radio Symphony Orchestra. Festival events include jazz, classical, and rock concerts, a cross-country race, public debates, children's programs, poetry readings, and theatrical productions. The program varies from year to year, but the events are always held in a variety of indoor and outdoor sites throughout the city. More... | |
| Word Trivia | |
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Today's topic: storehousemagazine - Considered a "storehouse" for articles; the word comes from Arabic makhzan, "storehouse," and was first used in book titles presenting a "store" of information about specific topics. More... ambry - Another word for a treasury, storehouse, place to keep things. More... garner - Originally a storehouse or granary. More... thesaurus - Comes from Greek thesauros, meaning "storehouse, treasury," and its original sense was "dictionary or encyclopedia," but this was narrowed to the current meaning with the appearance of Roget's in 1852. More... | |