Lately, I’ve had the honor of working with veteran Millbrook author Brian P. Cleary, the mastermind behind the Words Are CATegorical® series. When he’s not coming up with witty new rhymes for our books, he’s sharing bits of word wisdom on his Facebook page.
Keep these tidbits in your back pocket for the next cocktail party or PTA meeting:
- GRIEF BACON?? From the Foreign Words We Could Use in English Department: KUMMERSPECK is a German word meaning “excess weight gained from emotional overeating.” Literally, grief bacon.
- WITHOUT LOOKING IT UP, can you guess what SARCOLOGY is the study of? A.) The soft tissues. B.) Planets and solar system. C.) Multicellular plants. D.) Prehistoric life.
- UNFRIENDED used in the 17th Century? According to our friends at Mental Floss, the word is used in 1659: “I Hope, Sir, that we are not mutually Un-friended by this Difference which hath happened betwixt us.”
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| Keep an eye out for Brian’s newest Words Are CATegorical ® title, coming in Fall 2013! |
Check out Brian’s Facebook page for more such gems. (You can view the page even if you don’t have a Facebook account of your own. And if you are a Facebook user, you can “like” the page to get a daily dose of word fun.)