Happy New Year!

Merry Christmas, MIP readers! Thank you for “tuning in” here to read my posts. I know you have plenty of to occupy your time during the holidays without reading blog posts!

My 10th most favorite blog post of the year is probably one of your favorites, too. At least I get the most unsolicited comments for this MIP feature: Word of the Week. As most of you know, I go to the Word of the Day list at Merriam-Webster Online and create a list of words I don’t know. Then, I write the Word of the Week post on Mondays and offer silly guesses about what the definition for that word might be. The WOW feature is often a good way for this writer to remain humble–most of you know these words and I quite obviously don’t! See what I mean here.

While the WOW feature has been a part of MIP since it began, this feature is new this year: My Favorite Things. I pick out the favorite products, sites, and services in my life and in my home and tell why I like them. Most of you agreed that one of the greatest inventions of the 21st century has to be the evolution of Amazon.com and particularly their wish list feature. Go here to see why my holiday shopping is so much easier with Amazon.com on the job.

Friday’s Post: #8 and # 7!

You Might Also Like: The 12 Days of MIP 2014: 12 & 11; The 12 Days of MIP: 12 & 11; The 12 Days of MIP: 10 & 9; and The 12 Days of MIP: 8 & 7

Book Club Readers: Are you ready to read Songs in the Key of Solomon tomorrow? You do NOT want to miss this one–trust me. Click here for the MIP Suggested Reading Plan.

Happy Monday, WOW Lovers! Last week’s Word of the Week (WOW) was offal and two long-time MIP readers chimed in with two correct definitions! And without knowing it, they submitted their guesses as father and son! I’m going to have to declare the son the winner, though, because he gave the first definition listed in Merriam-Webster, while “Dad” submitted the 2nd most common definition. So, congrats to Bruce for the winning guess and congrats to John on an honorable mention definition guess. I have a sneaky suspicion that there’s going to be some father and son razzing about this in the weeks to come. Here are those correct guesses, along, with a 3rd one as defined by Merriam-Webster Online:

offal: 1. the organs (such as the liver or kidney) of an animal that are used for food 2. the waste or by-product of a process: as trimmings of a hide, the by-products of milling used especially for stock feeds, or the viscera and trimmings of a butchered animal removed in dressing 3. rubbish

No matter how you define it, if you ask me, offal sounds awful.

Today’s WOW is preterit. Here are my definition guesses for preterit:

preterit: (‘pre-tə-rət) 1. the preparations one makes to tear it up, whatever “it” is. 2. achieving before it’s necessary to achieve it 3. an idiot who can’t spell prefer correctly

What’s your definition guess for preterit? Click here to submit it. Maybe you can outdo Bruce and John this week! 🙂

Wednesday’s Post: The Odd Days of July…

You Might Also Like: Word of the Week: offal; Word of the Week: shinplaster; Word of the Week: perdure; Word of the Week: eidetic; and Word of the Week: mien

Howdy, Word Lovers! It’s time for a new Word of the Week (WOW). Last week’s WOW was perdure and Merriam-Webster Online says that perdure means to continue to exist. Sounds very much like endure, hunh? But, I suppose endure carries with it the connotation that one continues to exist through pain or adversity and perdure does not. Thus, we could say that blue jeans perdure while my bottom endures their tight, low-waisted, non-flattering fit most days. 

This week’s WOW is shinplaster. This was just too fun a word to ignore, so here are my guesses for shinplaster: shinplaster:

(ˈshin-ˌplas-tər) 1. a permanent state of anyone who plasters for a living 2. how an arthritic shin feels on any given Monday 3. the shaky nature of a drunkard’s legs after a party weekend So, what is your guess for shinplaster? Be sure to let me know!

Wednesday’s Post: Spam Themes That MIP Seems to Attract

You Might Also Like: Word of the Week: perdure; Word of the Week: eidetic; Word of the Week: mien; Word of the Week: risible; and Word of the Week: pettifogger

Happy Monday, Word Lovers! (Okay, so fake it ’til you make it, if happy Mondays are not your thing. And yes, I fake it a lot.)

Last week’s WOW (Word of the Week) was eidetic. This word sounded so familiar to me and I just can’t place it, so this one is just bugging me and I don’t like that! Here’s the Merriam-Webster Online definition so I can put myself out of my misery: marked by or involving extraordinarily accurate and vivid recall especially of visual images. If this is so, I think we can assume Sherlock Holmes had an eidetic memory and I’m pretty sure so does the darling daughter. When she was growing up, she was always my “go-to” girl for knowing where I left my car keys.

Today’s word is perdure. Submit your guess below or play the “MIP WOW Definition Guess Contest” by submitting the guess in an email to little old me!  Here are my guesses:

perdure: (pər-ˈdu̇r, –ˈdyu̇r) 1. what a person does when eating Perdue chicken 2. the misspelling of my alma mater 3. how one spells perjure on a message board if they can’t find the letter j.

See–I know your guesses will be better than mine!

Wednesday’s Post:  New Anniversaries…

You Might Also Like: Word of the Week: eidetic; Word of the Week: mien; Word of the Week: risible; Word of the Week: pettifogger; and Word of the Week: hoise