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... all high school graduates should know, according to our friends at the AHD. How do we measure up? http://makeashorterlink.com/?N2F2213D1
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How do we measure up?Not bad at a quick glance, Auntlette - but I have to question many of the choices of our friends at the AHD. I suppose the authority of any list that is meant to help denote "a superior command of the language" is going to be questionable. 
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Carpal Tunnel
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Thanks for the link, AnnaS.
Good list--some were surprising because they were not challenging at all (e.g., vortex, soliloquy, hypotenuse)--but a couple of the ones associated with science, for instance, I wouldn't know how to use correctly. Overall, I'd say 95% of them I was very familiar with. About 5% I'd have to fudge on--and probably wouldn't use them correctly (e.g., nanotechnology).
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Carpal Tunnel
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cir·cum·lo·cu·tion = I don't know *about the word, but the concept...
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ziggurat - how useful. ( - "Just going off to the ziggurat dear")
jj
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there's also a certain irony in a USn site explaining or dealing with the meaning of irony, presumably to other USns. (Who was it who first described the US as an "irony free zone"?)
jj
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Who was it who first described the US as an "irony free zone"?
We use irony. We just call it lying.
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a hit ,a very palpable hit...
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I used to think irony was spelled C-A-G-T . But maybe it's u-d-t-b-s-c.
k
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Epiphany is a word I have to look up repeatedly. Sunday school didn't beat it into me.
Gerrymander is a word of such limited use, only people from Massachusetts should be
expected to know it. Last use I remember is when Barney Franks robbed Margaret Heckler
of a large part of her consttituenecy, thirty years or more ago.
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Gerrymandering is alive and well and reasserts itself every ten years.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Dear Faldage: I'm glad you didn't ask me to tell about Elbridge Gerry. I'll bet no other member
except a New Englander ever heard of him.
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Elbridge Gerry
Pronounced [garry]. That notwithstanding gerrymander is pronounced [jerrymander].
We learned about him in our grammar school history classes in Chicago.
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Dear Faldage: Massachusetts schools are so backward I had to wait until I got into
highschool to learn about Elbridge Gerry.
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Dear Dr. Bill
My memory is sloppy enough. It may have been high school. I'm sure I didn't have to wait till I got to Boston to learn about this sterling role model for modern day politicians.
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Dear Faldage: as a happy result of your needling me (I love it) I looked up Elbridge Gerry in
encyclopedia, and was amazed to find he was Harvard man and Vice President under Madison.
I had grossly under-estimated him. I had also not known pronuncitation of his last name.
(like clerk being pronounced clark). Keep up the good work.
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And you, Dr. Bill, keep looking things up, reporting and expanding our knowledge.
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Dear Faldage: twist AS's arm to find us another hundred words.
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old hand
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I'll bet no other member except a New Englander ever heard of him.
You would lose that bet, wwh. I fell in love with the word gerrymander back in high school, which was a fair step from New England.
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enthusiast
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I PASSED!!!!!!!!! I'm not a graduate of high school but I did ace the test, I'm not sure if I would have before I spent half my life on AWAD though. As for gerrymandering, as a regular subscriber to Private Eye, this is a familiar word to me,there was a well publicised incident in London a few years ago which was exposed in the Eye's 'Rotten Boroughs' section. I never knew the etymology though, very interesting.
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Not a very good picture, but here is a URL with picture from which you can get an idea of how voting district lines were re-drawn suggesting to political cartoonist a salamander-like outline: You have to scroll down at least a third of the way. http://imaginatorium.org/books/maps.htm
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dodyskin - Given your day of arrival here at AWAD, that makes you the most orthographical almost-one-year-old I've ever had the pleasure of *seeing. 
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And you, Dr. Bill, keep looking things up, reporting and expanding our knowledge.Egad, Tweedlitis is infectious! 
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Dear fishonabike: as an extreme of idiocy, I remind myself of Charlemagne trying in his old
age to learn Latin. I despair of achieving literacy commensurate with my ambition.
How I wish I could read as much as fast as the rest of you can. But it's fun trying
Thank you for your kind words. Bill.
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How I wish I could read as much as fast as the rest of you canNot me, Bill - I like cycling 'cos you can take your own time and take in the scenery. But it's fun tryingRespect!
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Had them read to me and got all but seven - and six were on new blood stuff or geometry that I have forgotten most of. The seventh was sanguine....that was a surprise. The opposite of what Ithought.
Thanks for the list.
Nice work!
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wrought (rôt) v. A past tense and a past participle of work.§ adj. 1. Put together; created: a carefully wrought plan. 2. Shaped by hammering with tools. Used chiefly of metals or metalwork. 3. Made delicately or elaborately. [Middle English wroght < Old English geworht, past participle of wyrcan, to work; see werg- in App.]
I always thought "wrought" meant shaped by twisting, and was the past tense of "wring," analogous to "brought/bring."
Whom are we to believe, me or some strange dictionary?
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>Whom are we to believe, me or some strange dictionary?
<fill-in-the-blank stare>
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Whom are we to believe, me or some strange dictionary?
You both *make sense given the common US'n use of "wrought iron"... or is this rota irony? [ouch]
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Well, well.
NI3 agrees with That Other Dictionary we were just talking about, and says the past tense of "wring" is "wrung."
Wrought means shaped "by artistry or effort," according to them.
Live and learn.
Anybody know what OED says?
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The special thing about wrought iron is that it is made of soft steel, which is
extremely malleable, so smith can show off
by adding decorative twists and bends not possible with cast iron.
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Anybody know what OED says?
I could care less!
I'm really trying...
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old hand
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>I'm really trying...
But do you manage to be so without really trying?
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"I'm really trying."
Why be difficult, when with just a little more offort you can be impossible.
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Not that I want to recreate the descript/prescript arguement here... on the contrary. In this case, they both win - whether or not the Omnipotent Exclusionary Dictationers decide to accept its usage. Just think, this could all be a moot pointWho are we to dam wolfaholicodoc's (or my) creative juices?  How long does it take before slang (or dialect) becomes an actual word? I say it's immediate! ------------------- In my office, there's a sign that says "If you're grouchy, irritable or just plain mean, there will be a 10$ charge for putting up with you.
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wring, strong verb of class III: wringan, wrang, (ge)wrungen
work, weak verb of class 1 wyrcan, worhte, worht
worhte, through the magic of metathesis, became wrought.
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work, weak verb of class 1 wyrcan, worhte, worht
worhte, through the magic of metathesis, became wrought.
I understand what you're saying; still, it sounds like witchcraft (for the obvious reason) whenever I read that derivation.
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