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A.Word.A.Day--piacular Pronunciation: WAV or RealAudio piacular (pie-AK-yuh-luhr) adjective 1. Making expiation or atonement for a sacrilege. 2. Requiring expiation; wicked or blameworthy. [Latin piacularis, from piaculum, propitiatory sacrifice, from piare, to appease, from pius, dutiful.] "Dogs were also favourite piacular victims, as in the Lupercalia (February 15)." Foot Moore, George, History Of Religions: Chapter I, History of the World, 1 Jan 1992. What is the most famous number in history? The one that is both irrational and transcendental, and pursued since ancient times in Babylon, Egypt, India, and beyond, the one with a feature film made around it, the one that appeared in the O.J. Simpson Murder Trial, the one that has been calculated to billions of decimal digits? Of course, we are talking about pi, everyone's favorite number that continues to consume both countless hardcore mathematicians as well as ordinary mortals! March 14 (3.14) is Pi Day. Need some ideas to celebrate this happi day? Point your browser to here or here and pick a few pi songs. Grab any instrument, a piano, pipe, or a piccolo, and pirouette away on those pithy compositions. Bake a pie, pita, or a pizza (but don't pig out, leave a few pieces for others) and organize a picnic at the pier, gather your pigments and paint a picture at the piazza, or pen some picaresque prose. O pioneers, piffle not for even a picosecond, come celebrate this week with a pierian pilgrimage to pi by picking up a few words beginning with pi. -Anu P.S. March 14 also marks AWAD's fifth anniversary! X-Bonus Think like a man of action, act like a man of thought. -Henri Bergson

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