Fiasco

A fiasco is a thing that is a complete failure; a disaster, especially in a ludicrous or humiliating way.  I recently read about a fiasco full of wine! 

 It turns out to be a typical Italian style of bottle, usually with a round body and bottom, partially or completely covered with a close-fitting straw basket.  The sort of bottle that Chianti used to appear in with a  good steak dinner at Berni Inns when I was young.  I've quaffed many a fiasco - and also been a part of a few!

To bite the bullet

   To "bite the bullet" is to endure a painful or otherwise unpleasant situation that is seen as unavoidable.  The phrase was first recorded by Rudyard Kipling in his 1891 novel The Light that Failed.   It is often stated that it is derived historically from the practice of having a patient clench a bullet in his or her teeth as a way to cope with the pain of a surgical procedure without anesthetic. But evidence for biting a bullet rather than a leather strap during surgery is sparse.  It os more likely to have evolved from the British empire expression "to bite the cartridge", which dates to the Indian Rebellion of 1857. In this version of the etymology, the idea of tolerating necessary hardship refers to the British wish that the sepoys would ignore any small presence of animal fat in their paper cartridges.

Podcast

A podcast is a ‘multimedia digital file made available on the Internet for downloading to a portable media player, computer, etc.’  Err?  OK.  I think I understood that.  But isn’t a blog or an ordinary webpage often multi-media?  And isn’t a blog/webpage also available on the Internet?  And can’t it also be downloaded to a portable media player like a phone or a computer?  I tried to understand the difference by reading the article by the Goddess Wiki but it included phrases like ‘It is very much a horizontal media form’ – so I gave up.  Can anyone give me a clear and easily understood explanation of what a podcast is?

Catarolysis

Catarolysis is something I try not to do but occasionally my worse nature gets the better of me and I cannot help myself.   

Recently, for example, I was advised by the Department of Work and Pensions that my appeal against their judgement that I was fit enough to be working had been won.  I celebrated.  Hooray. A week later I got a letter with an enormous medical questionnaire to fill in – to start the whole process all over again. Persecution I call it.  I just couldn’t refrain from catarolysis.   

Catarolysis means letting off steam by cursing.

Prolepsis

In its simplest form prolepsis is anticpation.  In grammar it is the anticipation and answering of possible objections in rhetorical speech - the answering of an argument before one's opponent has put it forward.

It is also the anachronistic representation of something as existing before its proper or historical time;

The Free Dictonary by Farlex also adds -
a) the assignment of something, such as an event or name, to a time that precedes it, as in If you tell the cops, you're a dead man.
b) The use of a descriptive word in anticipation of the act or circumstances that would make it applicable, as dry in They drained the lake dry.
 

Pandy

To say that one had been pandied sounds rather jolly.  I (and GB) can assure you it isn’t.  Our Prep. school had one or two teachers who enjoyed pandying for no good reason.  It is an alternative word for being caned on the hand with a stick.  Such a pleasant sounding word shouldn’t be used for such an unpleasant experience!

  

Fulgor and fulgurous

Fulgor is an archaic word meaning dazzling brightness, splendour.   

Its adjective, fulgurous, is not mentioned as being archaic and therefore is presumably in current usage.  (Note the change of the 'o' to a 'u' in the word).  It is described as meaning dazzling; amazingly impressive; eye-popping; suggestive of the flashing of lightning or the cracking of a whip; emitting flashes of lightning or similar to lightning.

Lairwite

In medieval England, lairwite was a fine paid by a villein to the lord of the manor after his daughter committed fornication or adultery. Also spelled leywrite, learwite, and leyrewite. Some historians, such as Zvi Razi in Life, Marriage and Death in a Medieval Parish: Economy, Society and Demography in Halesowen, 1270-1400 , contend that this statement implies an illegitimate birth; however, not all historians agree that this action always resulted in the birth of a child.

Sorner

  
A sorner was at one time a criminal.  He used force or meance to procure food or lodgings for himself.  Gradually the criminal element of it declined and the word simply came to mean one who obtruded on others – especially his relatives and so-called friends - for his bed and board; an unwelcome guest.  Quite a few sorners made appearances in P G Wodehouse's books. The word seems to have fallen into disuse which is a shame since there are still a few sorners around.

Epistemology

Epistemology is a branch of philosophy that investigates the origin, nature, methods, and limits of human knowledge; the study of knowledge and justified belief.

I have just come across the word in ‘Galileo's Dream’ by Kim Stanley Robinson – a brilliant book which has given me, altogether, nineteen new words and a lot of quotations.  And that is not counting a number of words in Italian or of a very scientific nature that I didn’t look up.