C
(chat) see
CCC
(chat, Internet) hugs for people you can't
quite reach around
CMIIW
(web, chat) correct me if I'm wrong
CU
(e-mail, SMS) see you, see ya
CUL8R
(web, chat) see ya later; see you later
CW2CU
(chat) can't wait to see you
CWOT
- complete
- waste
of time
- complete
waste
- time
- waste
(SMS Dictionary etc.) Complete waste of time.
Example:
A friend of us actually has a folder named CWOT
where he dumps all the random stuff from the Internet
he is always downloading.
CYA
(chat) See ya!
CYAL8R
(web, chat) see ya later; see you later
Calamity
Jane
- Calamity
- Jane
- Martha
Jane Cannary Burke
- Martha
Burke
- Martha
Cannary
- Jane
Cannary Burke
- Jane
Burke
- Jane
Cannary
- Cannary
- Burke
1. The Jane who predicts the calamity; a prophet
of disaster.
Example:
She's a real calamity Jane. You've only got to catch
a bad cold for her to start thinking of coffins.
2. A person whom something always happens
to. History:
The name was coined as a nickname for Martha
Jane Cannary Burke, an American marksperson.
Martha Canary is an American frontier figure.
She was born in Princeton,
Missouri, about 1848-1856,
and died in 1903. Journeying to the gold fields
of Montana with her parents in 1864, she and her siblings were often left
alone to fend for themselves. By 1869 both parents
were dead, and there is evidence that Martha
was alone in the small Union Pacific railroad camp
of Piedmont,
Wyoming, probably working in
a boarding house. From there she traveled to railroad
towns and military posts making her living any way
she could, at times working as a prostitute.
The first historical record of Martha using
the name of Calamity Jane is when
she accompanied the Jenney-Newton geological expedition
into the Black Hills in 1875.
Her career as a camp follower continued when she
joined General George Crooks expedition against
the Lakota in February 1876, and a second Crook-led
expedition that same spring.
This hard drinking woman wore men's clothing, used
their bawdy language, chewed tobacco and was handy
with a gun. At her death, the "White Devil
of the Yellowstone" was remembered as a saint by the citizens of Deadwood,
where she nursed victims of a smallpox epidemic
in 1878. She was something of a local legend because
the Sioux Indians left her alone (as well as because
of her eccentricities, braveness and kindness).
Probably, it was from her that Bret Harte
took his famous character of Cherokee Sal
in "The Luck of Roaring Camp".
Why "Calamity"? That's what
she'd threaten to any man who bothered her - a calamity.
Or perhaps it was due to her heroic efforts during
the smallpox epidemic. Or maybe it was a description
of a very hard and tough life.
According to the "Life and Adventures of
Calamity Jane" (By Herself): "After
that campaign I returned to Fort Sanders, Wyoming,
[and] remained there until spring of 1872, when
we were ordered out to the Muscle Shell or Nursey
Pursey Indian outbreak. In that war, Generals Custer,
Miles, Terry and Crook were all engaged. This campaign
lasted until fall of 1873. It was during this campaign
that I was christened Calamity Jane. It was
on Goose Creek, Wyoming, where the town of Sheridan
is now located. Capt. Egan was in command of the
Post. We were ordered out to quell an uprising of
the Indians, and were out for several days, had
numerous skirmishes during which six of the soldiers
were killed and several severely wounded. When on
returning to the Post we were ambushed about a mile
and a half from our destination. When fired upon
Capt. Egan was shot. I was riding in advance and
on hearing the firing turned in my saddle and saw
the Captain reeling in his saddle as though about
to fall. I turned my horse and galloped back with
all haste to his side and got there in time to catch
him as he was falling. I lifted him onto my horse
in front of me and succeeded in getting him safely
to the Fort. Capt. Egan on recovering, laughingly
said: "I name you Calamity Jane, the
heroine of the plains." I have borne that name
up to the present time."
3. (World golf) The name that Bobby
Jones gave to his putter. Also putters modeled after
his hickory-shafted blade putter.
Cat got your
tongue
- Cat
got one's tongue
- Cat
got your tongue?
- Cat
- got
- get
- tongue
Why aren't you talking?; Is there a reason that
you're not speaking?
Example:
Why don't you answer me? Cat got your tongue?
Etymology:
The phrase probably comes from a custom in the Mideast
hundreds of years ago, when it was common to punish
a thief by cutting off their right hand, and a liar
by ripping out their tongue. These severed body
parts were given to the king's pet cats as their
daily food.
On the other hand, probably someone thought up this
saying to ask, "Why don't you talk?" in
a clever way, and it caught on.
By the mid-1800s this expression was popular in
both the United States and Britain. Though no one
is absolutely sure where it came from, but you can
imagine that if a cat really got hold of your tongue,
you wouldn't be able to say a word.
Central European Time
- Central
- European
- Time
- CET
The time used in Central Europe (France, Germany
etc.). It is 2 hours late in relation to Moscow.
Certificate of Good Standing
- Certificate of Existence
- Certificate of Authorization
- Certificate
- Good Standing
- Good
- Standing
- Existence
- Authorization
a certificate issued by a state official as conclusive
evidence that a corporation is in existence and
is authorized to transact business within that state.
The certificate generally sets forth the corporation's
name and declares that it is duly incorporated or
authorized to transact business, that all fees,
taxes, and penalties owed to that state have been
paid, that its most recent annual report has been
filed, and that it has not yet filed articles of
Dissolution.
Example:
In addition every applicant must provide a certificate
of good standing from each of his or her home law
societies, bars, chambers or courts. (Solicitors'
information packs)
Synonyms:
Certificate of Existence, Certificate of Authorization
Chickens come home to roost
- Chickens
- come home
- roost
- Chicken
- come
- home
Words or actions come back to haunt a person; evil
acts will return to plague
the doer; we cannot escape the consequences of our
actions.
Example:
You'd better be careful what you say when you're
angry. Chickens come home to roost.
Etymology:
In 1810 the English poet Robert South wrote,
"Curses are like young chickens; they
always come home to roost." If you live
on a farm, you'll know that chickens allowed to
run around the barnyard come back to the chicken
coop to sleep. In this expression the "chickens"
are angry words or thoughtless actions. When they
"come home to roost", they
come back to cause trouble. In other words, everyone
has to deal with the results of his or her own actions.
Cockaigne
- land
- Cockayne
- land
of Cockayne
[kah-KAYN]
Also: Cockayne.
An imaginary land of ease and luxury.
Examples:
1) Outside, in the dark, a wobbly
patch of life upon the blue snow, the deer perhaps
browsed, her soft blob of a nose rapturously sunk
in the chilly winter greenery, her modest brain-stem
steeped in some dream of a Cockaigne for herbivores.
(John Updike, "Toward the End of Time")
2) Everyone was seeking renewal, a golden
century, a Cockaigne of the spirit. (Umberto
Eco, "Foucault's Pendulum")
Etymology:
"Cockaigne" comes from Middle
English "cokaygne", from Middle
French "(pais de) cocaigne"
- "(land of) plenty," ultimately adapted
or derived from a word meaning "cake."
Trivia: References to Cockaigne
are prominent in medieval European lore. George
Ellis, in his "Specimens of Early English
Poets" (1790), printed an old French poem
called "The Land of Cockaign" (13th
century) where "the houses were made of barley
sugar and cakes, the streets were paved with pastry,
and the shops supplied goods for nothing."
Synonym:
land of Cockaigne.
Curiosity killed the cat
Be cautious when investigating situations.
Etymology: The saying originally was "care
kills a cat," and began in the 16th century.
"Care" was a warning that worry was bad
for everyones health and could lead to an early
grave; the phrase was a recognition that cats seemed
to be very cautious and careful. Over time, the word "care" evolved into "curiosity."
c%l
(SMS) cool
c&g
(SMS) chuckle and grin
ca$et
(SMS) casset
cabal
[kuh-BAHL; kuh-BAL]
1. A secret, conspiratorial association of
plotters or intriguers whose purpose is usually
to bring about an overturn especially in public
affairs.
2. The schemes or plots of such an association.
3. To form a cabal; to conspire; to intrigue;
to plot.
Examples:
1) If you constantly disagreed with
Winters, he wrote you out of his cabal, his conspiracy
against the poetry establishment. (Richard Elman,
"Namedropping: Mostly Literary Memoirs")
2) My father always had been a collector.
There were the stamps, National Geographics, scrapbooks
filled with his favorite political cartoons, and
booklets justifying his belief that the world was
under the control of a global cabal of elites unified
by such organizations as the Trilateral Commission,
the Council on Foreign Relations, and the Freemasons.
(Frederick Kempe, "Father/Land")
3) But the new world of toys is by
no means simply the product of a profit-mad cabal
of toy pushers discovering new ways of exploiting
the child market. (Gary Cross, "Kids' Stuff")
4) The Anti-Federalists were not simply
concerned that Congress was too small relatively
- too small to be truly representative of the great
diversity of the nation. Congress was also too small
absolutely - too small to be immune from cabal and
intrigue. (Akhil Reed Amar, "The Bill of
Rights")
Etymology:
"Cabal" derives from Medieval
Latin "cabala", a transliteration
of Hebrew "qabbalah" ("received,"
hence "traditional, lore"), from "qabal"
("to receive"). The evolution in sense
is: "(secret) tradition, secret, secret plots
or intrigues, secret meeting, secret meeters, a
group of plotters or intriguers."
cabarenaissance
(Brit.) A term attempting to conjure up a
fashion of the moment.
Example:
"Johnnie Walker Gold Label" ... decided
that the "cabarenaissance" provided the
perfect backdrop to launch a new "serving suggestion"
intended to attract the younger whisky sipper. (Jonathan
Heaf, "Life is a cabaret", The Guardian,
Friday July 2, 2004)
Etymology: The word is formed by wedging
"cabaret" and "renaissance"
together. It refers to a type of dressy night out,
one step up in sophistication from clubbing - if
it is possible to describe a mixture of cocktails,
jazz, dance cards and striptease in that way.
cabbage
[KAB-ij]
1. A type of leafy vegetable.
2. Steal, filch; pilfer, take someone else's
things.
Example:
In the late 18th-century play "The Reconciliation",
Mrs. Grim confesses that she "now and then
cabbaged a penny."
History:
Does the "filching" sense of "cabbage"
bring to mind an image of thieves sneaking out of
farm fields with armloads of pilfered produce? If
so, you're in for a surprise. That "cabbage"
has nothing to do with the leafy vegetable. It originally
referred to the practice among tailors of pocketing
part of the cloth given to them to make garments.
The verb was cut from the same cloth as an older
British noun "cabbage,"
which meant "pieces of cloth left in cutting
out garments and traditionally kept by tailors as
perquisites." Both of those ethically questionable
"cabbages" probably derived
from "cabas," the Middle French
word for "cheating or theft." The "cabbage"
found in cole slaw, on the other hand, comes from
Middle English "caboche," which
means "head."
cabin fever
Boredom and restlessness resulting from being indoors
too long.
Examples:
1) After the tenth straight day of
snow, I started getting cabin fever. 2)
Ned was sick with the flu, and by the end of the
week he had a bad case of cabin fever.
Etymology:
A 'cabin' is a small house, and 'fever'
is sickness. So if you have 'cabin fever',
you are sick of being inside your house.
cachet
[ka-SHAY]
1. A seal used especially as a mark of official
approval.
2. A feature or quality conferring
prestige; also: prestige.
Example:
Robin's chosen college didn't have the same cachet
as an Ivy League school, but it had the best program
for her needs.
Etymology:
In the years before the French Revolution, a "lettre
de cachet" was a letter, signed by both
the French king and another officer, that was used
to authorize a person's imprisonment. Documents
such as these were usually made official by being
marked with a seal pressed into soft wax. This seal
was known in French as a "cachet".
This word derived from the Middle French verb "cacher,"
meaning "to press" or "to hide."
The "seal" sense of "cachet"
has been used in English since the mid-17th century,
and in the 19th century it acquired its extended
sense, that of a distinguishing mark that is used
to identify something as being prestigious.
cachinnate
[KAK-uh-nayt]
to laugh loudly or immoderately
Example:
"He looked in at the door and snickered, then
in at the window, then peeked down from between
the rafters and cachinnated till his sides must
have ached." (John Burroughs, "A Bed
of Boughs")
Etymology:
"Cachinnate" has been whooping
it up in English since the 19th century. The word
derives from the Latin verb "cachinnare",
meaning "to laugh loudly," and "cachinnare"
was probably coined in imitation of a loud laugh.
As such, "cachinnare" is much like
the Old English "ceahhetan", the
Old High German "kachazzen", and
the Greek "kachazein" - all words
of imitative origin that essentially meant "to
laugh loudly". Our word "cackle"
has a different ancestor than any of these words
(the Middle English "cakelen"),
but this word, too, is believed to have been modeled
after the sound of laughter.
cacophony
[kuh-KAH-fuh-nee]
1. Harsh or discordant sound; dissonance.
2. The use of harsh or discordant sounds
in literary composition.
Examples:
1) New York was then a cacophony of
sounds - a dozen accents ricocheting off surrounding
buildings as immigrant mothers called their children
home for supper, noon whistles blowing, vendors
hawking their wares on the streets, children shouting,
horses whinnying, and people yelling. (Herbert
G. Goldman, "Banjo Eyes")
2) The mammoth central station towered
over the platforms, and with the cacophony from
whooshing steam, shrill whistles, shouts and the
heaving of hand and horse carts, not only was it
the biggest, noisiest, most confusing experience
any of them had ever encountered, but the city was
almost unimaginable. (Christopher Ogden, "Legacy:
A Biography of Moses and Walter Annenberg")
Etymology:
"Cacophony" comes from Greek
"kakophonia", from "kakophonos",
from "kakos" ("bad")
+ "phone" ("sound").
The adjective form is cacophonous.
The opposite of cacophony is euphony.
cadge
1. Donation to a beggar.
2. A circular frame on which cadgers carry
hawks for sale.
3. (Proverb or slang) To beg for money;
to intrude or live on another meanly; to
ask for and get free; be a parasite.
Synonyms: mooch, bum, grub, sponge, beg,
nag 4. To obtain or seek to obtain
by wheedling.
Synonym: scrounge
5. (Proverb - English and Scotland)
To carry, as a burden.
6. (Proverb) To hawk or peddle,
as fish, poultry, etc.
Examples:
1) He is always shnorring cigarettes
from his friends.
2) He cadged a tenner off me yesterday.
3) See if you can cadge a lift to
the pub.
History, related words, more examples:
The word starts its recorded life with men of that
name in Northern England and Scotland in the late
15th c. They were itinerant hawkers and peddlers
with a horse and cart or a packhorse, who collected
butter, eggs, poultry and other farm produce for
sale in the local market and who in return took
out small items to farms from the local shops. They
did not enjoy a high reputation: often hard bargainers
and hard swearers ("to curse like a cadger"
was once a Scots simile), they were at the bottom
of the social order. An old Scots proverb says "the
king's errand may come to the cadger's gate yet",
meaning that even the highest in the land may sometimes
need the help of the most humble. About 1600 we
start to see the verb "to cadge",
meaning to carry things about, as a cadger
does. In the 19th c. the word went even further
downhill, when it started to be applied in England
to men who pretended to be hawkers or street traders
but who were actually beggars or tramps. An early
example, of 1860, is in "The Roman Question",
by Edmond About: "Pray give something
to yonder sham cripple; give to that cadger who
pretends to have lost an arm; and be sure you don't
forget that blind young man leaning on his father's
arm!" A little later, the word shifted
to refer to men who "borrowed" small sums
from acquaintances and friends but conveniently
forgot to return them. R. Austin Freeman
(an almost forgotten crime writer, well-known in
his day) acutely observed the type in "For
The Defence, Dr Thorndyke" of 1934: "Ronald
Barton was an inveterate cadger, a confirmed borrower;
and, as is the way of the habitual borrower, as
soon as the loan had been obtained, the transaction
was finished and the incident closed so far as he
was concerned." There's another sort of
"cadge", in falconry: the
padded wooden frame on which hooded hawks are taken
out to the field. This is often said to be linked
to the other senses but it seems instead to have
been an alteration of "cage" under
the influence of "cadge"
in the sense of carrying things. The man who carried
the cadge was also a cadger,
but despite comments in falconry books this has
nothing to do with the begging sense. There's also
"codger", which often turns
up these days as "old codger",
meaning a man who is mildly eccentric and of mature
years. This may well be a variation on "cadger"
that comes through the idea of an old beggar or
tramp (at one time in English dialect "codger"
could refer to a disagreeable or miserly old man)
but which has softened somewhat over time. Falconers
sometimes like to say this is also connected with
cadges, since those who carried them
were often old men good for nothing better. Again,
this just muddies the etymological waters.
cadre
[KAD-ree; -ray; KAH-dray; -druh]
1. A core or nucleus of trained or
otherwise qualified personnel around which an organization
is formed.
2. A tightly knit and trained group of dedicated
members active in promoting the interests of a revolutionary
party.
3. A member of such a group.
4. A group of people with a unifying relationship.
5. A framework upon which a larger entity
can be built.
Synonym: scheme.
Examples:
1) Trained cadres flowed across the
porous border and down the blossoming supply trail
through eastern Laos. (Peter Gay, "Pleasure
Wars")
2) Around 1880, the year Flaubert
died, the French avant-garde was made up of a cadre
of bitter, highly self-conscious poets, painters,
novelists, and critics. (Daniel Okrent, "Twilight
of the Boomers," Time, June 12, 2000)
3) The prison's existence was known only
to those who worked or were imprisoned there and
to a handful of high-ranking cadres, known as the
Party Center, who reviewed the documents emerging
from S-21 and selected the individuals and the military
and other units to be purged. (David Chandler,
"Voices From S-21)
4) The failure of the League of Nations
and the shock of Munich had spurred more support,
sometimes from names that were widely known, for
a federation of free peoples, a union of sovereign
states, or whatever similar arrangement might lower
the possibility of conflict. Adherents came from
the usual cadre of pious dreamers. (Hugo Young,
"This Blessed Plot")
Etymology:
Upon entering the English language around 1830 via
Sir Walter Scott's "Introduction
to The Lay of the Last Minstrel", this
word first meant "framework," and by the
1850s was a term for a group of people. It was borrowed
from the French "cadre" ("a
picture frame"), from Italian "quadro"
("framework"), from Latin "quadrum"
("square, four-sided thing").
Squares can make good frameworks -
a fact that makes it easier to understand why first
French speakers and later English speakers used
"cadre" as a word meaning "framework."
If you think of a core group of officers in a regiment
as the framework that holds things together
for the unit, you'll understand how the "central
unit" sense of "cadre"
developed. Military leaders and their troops are
well-trained and work together as a unified team,
which may explain why "cadre"
is now sometimes used more generally to refer to
any group of people who have some kind of unifying
characteristic, even if they aren't leaders.
caduceus
[kuh-DOO-see-us]
1. A figure of a staff with two snakes wound
around it and two wings at the top.
2. An insignia bearing a caduceus and symbolizing
a physician.
Example:
Adrienne knew she had found Dr. Moore's office when
she saw the familiar caduceus on the door.
Etymology:
Beware of snakes - at least snakes entwining heraldic
staffs - because they're not all caducei.
The genuine "caduceus"
takes its name from Latin, which in turn picked
up the name as a modification of Greek "karykeion,"
from "karyx" or "keryx,"
meaning "herald." Such a two-snake staff
was the symbol of messenger-gods Mercury and Hermes,
and it is still used in the insignia of the U.S.
Army medical corps. If you see just one snake and
no wings, there may be a doctor in the house, but
one who displays the staff of Aesculapius, the god
of medicine, rather than a true caduceus.
caesura
[sih-ZHUR-uh; -ZUR-]
plural: caesuras or caesurae
[sih-ZHUR-ee; -ZUR-ee]
1. A break or pause in a line of verse,
a break in the flow of sound, usually occurring
in the middle of a line, and indicated in scanning
by a double vertical line; for example, "The
proper study || of mankind is man" (Alexander
Pope, An Essay on Man).
2. Any break, pause, or interruption.
3. A pause marking a rhythmic point of division
in a melody.
Examples:
1) After an inconclusive day spent
discussing the caesura of "Sonnet"'s opening
line, Luke and his colleagues went for cocktails
at Strabismus. (Martin Amis, "Heavy Water
and Other Stories")
2) The crucial event of the Robedaux
family occurs offscreen, in a narrative caesura
between the film's two "acts." (Richard
Corliss, "The Patter of Little Footes,"
Time, May 13, 1985)
3) Say her name today in the right circles
and you'll notice a sudden intake of breath, a caesura
of pure awe. (Michael Dirda, "In which our
intrepid columnist visits the Modern Language Association
convention and reflects on what he found there,"
Washington Post, January 28, 2001)
4) During the historical caesura between
the total destruction of Aquileia and the seventh-century
foundation of the city of Heraclea as the first
political capital of the second Venice, the refugees
lived on Grado and the other islands, just as Cassiodorus
had seen them: humbly, simply, and by the toil of
their hands. (Patricia Fortini Brown, "Venice
and Antiquity")
5) Without so much as the caesura
of a drawn breath I was first shouting in joy, then
screaming in shock. (E.L. Doctorow, "World's
Fair")
History:
The word "caesura," borrowed
from Late Latin, is ultimately from Latin, from
the past participle of "caedere"
meaning "to cut", "caesura"
("a cutting off, a division, a stop").
Nearly as old as the 450-year-old poetry senses
is the general meaning "a break or interruption."
Caesuras (or caesurae)
are those slight pauses one makes as one reads verse.
While it may seem that their most obvious role is
to emphasize the metrical construction of the verse,
more often we need these little stops (which may
be, but are not necessarily, set off by punctuation)
to introduce the cadence and phrasing of natural
speech into the metrical scheme.
caitiff
[KAY-tif]
cowardly, despicable
Example:
The caitiff villain yet seemed... to have some sense
of his being the object of public detestation, which
made him impatient of being in public. (Sir Walter
Scott, "The Heart of Midlothian")
Etymology:
The adjective's more common, but "caitiff"
also occurs as a noun meaning "a base, cowardly,
or despicable person" (as in Shakespeare's
"Measure for Measure": "O thou
caitiff! O thou varlet! O thou wicked Hannibal!").
Both the adjective and the noun came into English
in the 14th century, and both evolved from the Anglo-French
adjective "caitif", meaning "wretched,
despicable". The French word in turn derived
from the Latin "captivus", meaning
"captive" - the shift from "captive"
to "wretched" perhaps prompted
by the perception of captives as wretched and worthy
of scorn.
cajole
[kuh-JOAL, -JOHL]
1. To persuade with flattery, repeated appeals,
soothing words, or gentle urging, especially
in the face of reluctance.
Synonym: coax
Examples:
1) Peter's friends cajoled him into
coming to the party even though he was not in the
mood to go.
2) If Robert had been an ordinary
ten-year-old he would have cajoled and whined, asked
and asked and asked until I snapped at him to keep
quiet. (Anna Quindlen, "Black and Blue")
3) One of Virgil's great accomplishments
was his ability to charm, cajole, weasel people
out of their bad moods, especially when their bads
moods inconvenienced him. (Anthony Tommasini,
"Virgil Thomson: Composer on the Aisle")
4) Whiz kept to himself and spent
long hours every day studying financials and technical
charts and reading impenetrable economic publications.
Even the warden had tried to cajole him into sharing
market tips. (Belfry Holdings, "The Brethren")
2. To deceive with soothing words or
false promises.
History, related words:
It's likely that words "cajole"
and "cage" are connected. Researchers
have made an association between the prattle of
a caged bird and the persistent
wheedling of a person attempting to get something
out of someone else. "Cajole"
comes from an Early Modern French verb, "cajoler,"
which now means "coax" but at one time
meant "to chatter like a bird in a cage, to
sing"; hence, "to amuse with idle talk,
to flatter; to chatter like a jay." Some etymologists
theorize that "cajoler" is from
"gaiole", "jaiole",
an Old North French word meaning "(bird)cage".
"Gaiole" derives from a Medieval
Latin word, "caveola," which means
"little cage" and is the diminutive of
the Latin "cavea" ("an enclosure,
a den for animals, a bird cage"), from "cavus"
- "hollow". It is related to "cave",
"cage" and "jail"
(British "gaol").
calamity leave
emergency leave to deal with family crises.
Example:
Calamity leave: This leave is meant
for very special personal circumstances that require
immediate action. Its duration varies from a few
hours to a few days-as long as is necessary to do
what needs to be done. Generally speaking the employer
will grant such leave and is obliged to do so to
an extent that is fair considering the nature of
the problem. In those cases where the employee is
entitled to ten-day leave the calamity leave will
only last one day and will then be replaced by the
ten-day leave. (The Netherlands' Caregiving Legislation)
call
call it a day
to stop work for the day; to bring a project to
an end for the time being.
Example:
You've been working on that history report since
before breakfast. Why don't you call it
a day?
Etymology:
The idea expressed in this idiom is that a certain
amount of work is enough for one day. When you've
done that amount, you should "call it
a day", meaning to declare that you've
done a full day's work and that you're stopping.
call one's bluff
- call your bluff
- call the bluff
- call
- bluff
To demand that someone prove a claim; to challenge
someone to carry out a threat; to challenge someone
to show that they are not being deceptive and can
actually do what they say they can do.
Examples:
1) My girlfriend always said that
she didn't want to get married so I called her bluff
and asked her to marry me. She said yes.
2) They're bragging they can beat
us badly. C'mon. Let's call their bluff.
Etymology:
This early 19th century American saying comes from
card playing. In poker, a player makes bets according
to what his hand is, compared to what he thinks
others' are. When you bluff, you pretend
you have a great hand of cards even when you don't,
and raise the bet to fake out the other players.
One makes an opponent show his or her cards to show
that they are weaker than they are pretending them
to be. If someone "calls your bluff",
he or she challenges you by meeting or raising your
bet ("to call" means to
match a bet) to make you show the cards you really
have.
call
smb. on the carpet
- call on the carpet
- walk the carpet
- walk
- call
- carpet
to call a person before an authority for a scolding.
Example:
My piano teacher called me on the carpet today.
He could tell I hadn't practiced all
week.
History:
There was an expression in Britain in the early
1800s, "to walk the carpet".
That referred to a servant's being called into the
parlor (which was always carpeted, unlike the servant's
quarters) to be scolded by the master or mistress
of the house. Later the saying was applied to an
unlucky employee being called to the boss's office
(also carpeted) to be bawled out. Today, if anyone
in authority scolds you, you are being "called
on the carpet" no matter how the floor
is actually covered.
call the shots
- call
the shot
- call
the tune
- call
one's shots
- call
one's shot
- call
- shots
- shot
1. to make the decisions; to be in charge
or control; to determine the policy or procedure;
to give orders; exercise authority; run the show.
Example:
1) You may know all about glassblowing,
but here in the gym, I call the shots.
2) Who is calling the shots in this
house?
Synonym: call the tune
2. to announce exactly what one is going
to do.
Example:
In some games played on the pool table, the shooter
is required to call his shots,
e.g. "Eight ball in the side pocket".
History:
The origin of this expression is unclear, but it
might refer to the officer in charge of soldiers
in a battle. He gives the commands and calls
the (gun) shots. The phrase
also suggests the role of a coach of a basketball
team who tells the players what plays to make and
what (basketball) shots to take. On
the other hand, "calling the shots"
might come from the game of billiards or pool, wherein
the player announces his shots in advance. Today
we say that the person in charge of any kind of
activity "calls the shots".
According to the Oxford English Dictionary,
"calling the shots" seems
to be a surprisingly recent phrase, having first
appeared in print in the late 1960s, although it
was probably in use as oral slang for years or even
decades before someone thought to use it in print.
An earlier phrase, "to call one's shots",
apparently was current by the 1930s.
callisthenics
- calisthenics
- calisthenic
exercise
- callisthenic
exercise
- exercise
- calisthenic
- callisthenic
Also: calisthenics (AmE)
Light exercise designed to promote general fitness;
a set of physical exercises that are intended to
make you thin and healthy; strengthening and beautifying
exercises.
Example:
Aliya Yusupova has won her first silver medal in
the all-round competitions in the callisthenics
world cup round in Baku.
Synonyms:
calisthenic exercise, callisthenic exercise.
Etymology:
1839, formed on model of Fr. "callisthenie",
from Gk. "kallos" ("beauty")
+ "sthenos" ("strength").
Originally, gymnastic exercises suitable for girls
and meant to develop the figure; training calculated
to develop the figure and promote graceful movement.
The proper Gk., if there was such a word in Gk.,
would have been "kallistheneia".
callithump
[KAL-uh-thump]
A noisy boisterous band or parade.
Example:
The town is trying to enlist one of Hollywood's
most famous leading men to serve as grand marshal
for this year's Memorial Day callithump.
History, related words:
"Callithump" and the related
adjective "callithumpian"
are Americanisms, but their roots stretch back to
England. In the 19th century, the noun "callithumpian"
was used in the U.S. of boisterous roisterers who
had their own makeshift New Year's parade. Their
band instruments consisted of crude noisemakers
such as pots, tin horns and cowbells. The antecedent
of "callithumpians" is an
18th-century British dialect term for another noisy
group, the "Gallithumpians," who
made a rumpus on election days in southern England.
Today, the words "callithump"
and "callithumpian" see
occasional use, especially in the names of specific
bands and parades. The callithumpian
bands and parades of today are more organized than
those of the past, but they retain an association
with noise and boisterous fun.
callow
[KAL-oh]
Immature; lacking adult perception, experience,
or judgment.
Examples:
1) Those who in later years did me
harm I describe as I knew them then, and I beg any
reader to remember that, although I was hardly callow,
I was not yet wise in the ways of the world. (Iain
Pears, "An Instance of the Fingerpost")
2) George Black Jr was grateful that
during his protracted courtship of Betty, his future
father-in-law 'bore my callow unsophistication with
benign indulgence'. (Richard Siklos, "Shades
of Black")
3) They watched in awe as Revere,
at first a callow and unambitious youth, began to
develop into a serious young man dedicated to books
and devoted to his father. (Sherwin B. Nuland,
"The Saint," New Republic, December 13,
1999)
Etymology:
"Callow" is from Old English
"calu" - "featherless, bald."
calm before the storm
a period of peace before a disturbance or crisis;
an unnatural or false calm
before a storm.
Example:
The meeting may be peaceful now, but this is only
the calm before the storm.
Etymology:
There was an ancient Greek proverb that said "Fair
weather brings on cloudy weather". Though
that's not always true, people have noticed since
the 1500s that there often was a period of stillness
before a big storm. For over four centuries the
meaning of this saying has been broadened to include
any time of false peacefulness right before a violent
outburst.
calumny
[KAL-uhm-nee]
1. False accusation of a crime or
offense, intended to injure another's reputation.
2. Malicious misrepresentation.
Synonym: slander.
Examples:
1) They would see to it that every
suspicious whisper and outright calumny would be
repeated in print, breathing fire into the growing
spirit of faction. (William Safire, "Scandalmonger")
2) They protest to him against the universal
order, and then reward his kind words by calumny
and accusations of... inhumanity and cruelty. (Paola
Capriolo, "Floria Tosca")
3) Be thou as chaste as ice, as pure
as snow, thou shalt not escape calumny. (Shakespeare,
"Hamlet")
4) "The idea that computer games
make children socially awkward adults is a preposterous
calumny," sputtered Ted.
Etymology, more examples, related words:
"Calumny" made an appearance
in these famous words from Shakespeare's "Hamlet":
"If thou dost marry, I'll give thee this plague
for thy dowry: be thou as chaste as ice, as pure
as snow, thou shalt not escape calumny. Get thee
to a nunnery, go." "Calumny"
had been in the English language for a while, though,
before Hamlet uttered it; the term first entered
English, from Middle French "calomnie,"
in the 15th century. "Calomnie" in turn
came from the Latin word "calumnia" (meaning
"false accusation," "false claim,"
or "trickery"), which itself came from
Latin "calvi," meaning "to form intrigues,
to deceive."
The adjective form is calumnious.
camarilla
[kam-uh-RIL-uh; -REE-yuh]
A group of secret and often scheming advisers, as
of a king; a cabal or clique.
Examples:
1) Mr Kiselev likened Yeltsin's entourage
to a "camarilla"... which would turn Russia
"into a gigantic banana republic corrupted
from top to bottom by a rotten clique of demagogues".
(Marcus Warren, "Moguls at war over control
of Kremlin," Daily Telegraph, July 23, 1999)
2) The arrest in October 1976 of Mao's
radical camarilla, the so-called Gang of Four, led
by his maniacal widow, Jiang Qing, was the second
"liberation," delivering the Chinese from
the most extreme forms of ideological conditioning.
(Willem Van Kemenade, "China, Hong Kong,
Taiwan, Inc.")
Etymology:
"Camarilla" comes from Spanish,
literally, "a small room," from Late Latin
"camera" - "chamber"
("vault; arched roof" in Latin), from
Greek "kamara" ("vault").
campanologist
[kam-puh-NAH-luh-jist]
One that practices or is skilled in the art
of bell ringing.
Example:
The fast pace of modern life has taken its toll
among practicing campanologists, and the art has
lost some of its appeal.
History, related words:
The first bells were rung some 4,000 years ago during
the Bronze Age, when those instruments were forged
and riveted from metal plates. By the 17th century,
bells were ringing around the world and in Britain
campanology had become a "gentleman's recreation."
But although the first campanologists' organization,
The Society of College Youths, was founded
in 1637, the words "campanology"
and "campanologist" (from
"campana," Late Latin for "bell")
did not debut in English publications until around
1823 and 1857 respectively.
campestral
[kam-PESS-trul]
Of or relating to fields or open country.
Synonym: rural.
Example:
The campestral scenery surrounding Reginald's new
home inspired him to take up landscape painting.
Etymology, related words:
Scamper across an open field, then,
while catching your breath, ponder this: "scamper"
and "campestral" both ultimately
derive from the Latin noun "campus,"
meaning "field" or "plain."
Latin "campester" is the adjective
that means "pertaining to a campus." In
ancient Rome, a campus was a place
for games, athletic practice, and military drills.
"Scamper" probably started
with a military association, as well (it is assumed
to have evolved from the Latin verb "excampare,"
meaning "to decamp"). In English, "campestral"
took on an exclusively rural aspect upon its introduction
in the 18th century, while "campus,"
you might say, became strictly academic.
camphor gum
- camphor
gum resin
- camphor
- gum
resin
- gum
- resin
Camphor, type of fragrant resin used in medicine
and in the production of perfumes.
Example:
Scargo is an all-natural blend of soothing and moisturizing
oils combined with stimulating camphor gum.
(For more information see: camphor
gum resin)
camphor gum resin
- camphor
gum
- resin
- camphor
- gum
resin
- gum
- Terebinth
gum resin
- Terebinth
- frankincense
Myrrh.
Example:
Christians usually call myrrh "camphor gum
resin".
Etymology, related words:
The word "myrrh" derives
from the Greek "myrrha", which
in turn derives from the Hebrew "murr"
("bitter"). It denotes the gummy, red-brown
sap of the Commiphora myrrha tree, indigenous
to Somalia and Ethopia, which is used in perfume
and incense. Terebinth gum resin is
also called frankincense.
can't hold a candle
- cannot hold a candle
- can't hold a candle to
- cannot hold a candle to
- hold a candle
- hold a candle to
- hold
- candle
When one thing is much better than another, people
say that the lesser thing "can't hold
a candle" to the better thing. It is similar
to saying that something "doesn't measure
up" to something else. Example: Mom,
this frozen pizza is good, but it can't hold a candle
to your homemade pizza!
canard
[kuh-NAHRD]
1. An unfounded, false, or fabricated
report or story.
2. A horizontal control and stabilizing surface
mounted forward of the main wing of an aircraft.
3. An aircraft whose horizontal stabilizer
is mounted forward of the main wing.
Examples:
1) This is just a canard that is assumed
to be true because it has been repeated so often.
(Bruce Bartlett, "Lower Taxes Higher Revenue?,"
National Review, March 13, 2003)
2) Loath as I am to resurrect the old
canard accusing writers or critics who dislike a
popular work of art of being jealous, in Byatt's
case, it might be true. (Charles Taylor, "quoted
in Rowling books 'for people with stunted imaginations,"
The Guardian, July 11, 2003)
3) Several students say they still believe
the canard that no Americans died in Bali - in fact,
six did. (Phil Zabriskie, "Did You Hear...?"
Time Asia, February 1, 2003)
4) Whether this was true (which seems
improbable) or was one of Lawrence's numerous canards
(which seems very possible), it appears that Father
did intend to strike camp at some time. (Douglas
Botting, "Gerald Durrell: The Authorized Biography")
Etymology:
In French "canard" means
"duck" or "false news; hoax".
The latter sense of the word probably comes from
the phrase "vendre un canard ? moiti?"
- "to half-sell a duck", which is to say,
not to sell it at all, hence "to
take in, to make a fool of."
canker
[KANG-ker]
1. To become infested with erosive or
spreading sores.
2. To corrupt the spirit of.
3. To become corrupted.
Example:
It was evident that their hearts were cankered with
discontent. (Samuel Johnson, "Rasselas")
Etymology:
"Canker" is commonly known
as the name for a type of spreading sore that eats
into the tissue - a