Free Rice, par 3: Level 50

Another few minutes of inspired guessing (while some guy came by to drop off a new 64 bit machine in my office, so clearly no work could be done, right?) has me up at 50. Woohoo!

The level 49 and 50 words I saw, with the meanings attributed to them by the game ("cantabile" is particularly dodgy). If you care to feel superior, you can tell yourself you knew the ones I got wrong (asterisked). You can also feel superior if you actually knew "unco", because that was a wild guess on my part.

Level 49:

*guerdon (reward)
*debouch (emerge)
lambrequin (drapery)
unco (remarkably)
cantabile (smoothly flowing)

Level 50:

kermis (festival)
*pasquinade (satirize)

I'm back down to 48, but I'm happy, fancy-free, and insouciant about my level now. Haha. 50. Take that, flash game thing! I have beaten you! I have fed the teeming multitudes in the process! On to the next challenge.

Free Rice, part 2

As mentioned before, I'm digging this. I made it up to level 49 and promptly got the one level 49 word wrong: megrim.

me.grim /'mE-gr&m/, noun [14th century]

1) (a) MIGRAINE (b) VERTIGO, DIZZINESS

2) (a) FANCY, WHIM b plural low spirits

[Middle English migreime, from Middle French migraine -- more at
MIGRAINE]

(C) 1997 by Merriam-Webster, Incorporated

Oh well. Back to 48, it is. I think 39 or 40 is where I'm really at (that is, I actually recognise all the words and know their meanings without looking at the answers), but it's not that hard to fake your way up a bit, especially if you know some other languages. *brag*brag* Next up: my SAT scores!

22: I've Started, So I'll Finish: The Story of Mastermind, Magnus Magnusson

A dry enumeration of names, dates, and specialised subjects pertaining to the extremely difficult BBC quiz Mastermind. Reading it allows me, if I go to some big British quizzing championship, to go "Ooooh, that's Kevin Ashman who won Mastermind in 1995!".

It's really not very entertaining, even if you are a big fan of Mastermind. 'Tis a shame.

Tonsillectomy

The GF, when she's had caffeine, has complained about the sounds emanating from my side of the bed. A sleep study was had, which resulted in my battling with wires and not sleeping, and an inconclusive diagnosis of "mild sleep apnea" and "mild snoring". The GF begs to differ.

Every medical professional (and many an amateur) who has looked in my mouth and down my throat has commented on the alarming size of my amygdala (tonsils, you tyro), and the current ENT doc was no different. This guy, however, had the courage to stand by his convictions and take arms against a sea of tonsils and, um, well, snip, snip, snip, you know? In the process, he also did an ultrasound turbinate reduction. Lots of pieces of me are now missing, but the theory is that these pieces just got in the way of the air that's supposed to flow in and out of me, so good riddance.

General anaesthesia is good fun. Well, apart from the needle part, because needles, as any sane living being knows, are no fun at all. I'm not down with changes in the topology of my skin, as I casually mentioned to the anaesthesiologist. There was a good amount of ribbing back and forth as I drifted off into dreamland. Do I joke more when nervous? After the unpleasant needle bit, there was no change for twenty seconds or so (I didn't have a watch, so who knows?). Then a tingling, first in my cheeks, jaw, and anus, then sides of the body and legs, then everywhere. I started to feel light-headed; like I was floating just before falling asleep. At this point I was still narrating everything that was happening to me, prompting more jocular exchanges with the doctors who seemed amused at my reactions to the whole process.

I woke up an hour and a bit later, with a sore throat, a woozy head, and a tremendous urge to laugh, cry, hug everybody around me, and go to med school. It's crazy how emotional the general made me. The nurses say it's a fairly common reaction. (I don't know about the med school part. That's probably less so.)

I'm taking steroids (methylprednisolone), antibiotics (azithromycin), and a pain killer (hydrocodone). This last one is a vile concoction which claims to have a fruity flavour. Fruity flavour my arse. This fruit has been through the cloaca magna and back, before being blended into a soothing mixture of kerosene and ammonia water. There's considerable pain when swallowing in the morning eight hours after my last dose of pain killer. A quick shot of that substance later, the swallowing pain is replaced by the memory of the incredible nastiness of the analgesic. It's almost not worth it, except I'd grow hungry without the ability to swallow. Day one: yoghurt, popsicles, mashed potatoes, and egg nog. So contrary to popular belief, I don't get to eat "just ice cream". In fact, I've had none! I will remedy tonight.

What did this have to do with books? Nothing, except that I have not been reading any (been watching crap television instead) and that I have tried to stick some big words in the above blathering.

Free Rice

Free Rice's a vocabulary quiz where every correct definition gets 10 grains of rice donated to end world hunger. That's not very many grains. The site claims that in almost a month and a half over two and a half billion grains of rice have been donated.

How many grains in a bowl of rice? I estimate on the order of 10,000 (and googlification of "grains in a bowl of rice" yields, among some calculations, the story of a fool who counted the grains in a quarter cup—10,000 is a little more than a cup, which yields a nice bowl). In 43 days, a quarter of a million bowls of rice were donated. Hey, that's not too shabby!

What does this have to do with reading? Not so much, except maybe you'll grow your vocabulary. "Paregoric"? "Rorqual"? "Footling"? For us slightly obsessive-compulsive ones, there's a score you can aim for. My current vocab level is 45. "There are 50 levels in all, but it is rare for people to get above level 48." Well, all right then. My goal is clear.

(In order: "medicine (a tincture of opium)", "a family of whale", and "1) inept; 2) trivial".)

21: Prisoner of Trebekistan: A Decade in Jeopardy!, Bob Harris

Mmm, yeah. Read it a while ago. It was not as good as Brainiac, but it was definitely worth reading. It's fun to see someone get excited, and obsessed, with a certain kind of knowledge.

xkcd: A webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math, and language.

I've been reading this, and it's lovably nerdy.