December 8, 2008

sepulcher \SEP-uhl-kuhr\, noun:

1. a burial place; tomb
2. a structure or niche in a church in which sacred relics are deposited on Good Friday and removed on Easter

c.1200, "tomb, burial place," especially in reference to the cave where Jesus was buried outside Jerusalem (Holy Sepulcher or Saint Sepulcher), from Old French sepulcre (11th century), from Latin sepulcrum "grave, tomb," from root of sepelire "to bury," originally "to perform rituals on a corpse."

academic bulemia

• The process of learning or memorizing by rote, subsequently followed by the regurgitation of that knowledge onto an exam answer sheet. Just as with the serious eating disorder, this form of bulemia results in no real retention of substance. This term is frequently applied to describe a common practice of young medical students.

I can't remember anything that I learned last night. It's like I grabbed the answer sheet, puked out all the answers and forgot everything immediately. I'd say that's academic bulemia.

Trivia

How much ethanol does a bushel of corn yield?

• Approximately 2.8 gallons.

Today in History:

• Immaculate Conception: the belief that the Virgin Mary was born free of sin was defined as a dogma by Pope Pius IX (1854)
• John Lennon: ex-Beatle and peace icon was shot to death outside his apartment in NYC by Mark David Chapman, a deranged fan (1980)
• CIS: the Commonwealth of Independent States was established instead of the USSR by Russia, Belarus and Ukraine (1991)

Today's Birthdays:

• Mary, Queen of Scots (1542-1587): Scottish queen; also, Sweden's queen Christina (1626-1689)
• Diego Rivera (1886-1957): muralist
• James Thurber (1894-1961): writer, cartoonist, "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty"
• Sammy Davis, Jr. (1925-1990): all-round entertainer, he sang, danced, acted and did impressions; also, actors Lee J. Cobb (1911-1976), Maximilian Schell (78), David Carradine (72), John Rubinstein (62), Kim Basinger (55), Teri Hatcher (44), Matthew Laborteaux (42) and Dominic Monaghan (32)
• James Galway (69): virtuoso flutist; other musicians born on this date include Jim Morrison (1943-1971), Gregg Allman (61), Warren Cuccurullo (52) and Sinead O'Connor (42)