Saturday, July 24, 2010

zaftig \ZAHF-tik\, adjective:

• Full-bodied; well-proportioned.

Zaftig is a borrowing from Yiddish, zaftik, literally meaning "juicy."

Eau d'ouche

• The obnoxious, headache-inducing cologne cloud that surrounds a beefy, tight-Armani-shirt wearing dude.

Ugh. Some big meathead just walked by wearing way too much eau d'ouche. I feel like I'm gonna puke.

Trivia

Which is the only U.S. state name that can be typed using letters only on the left side of the standard keyboard? How about when using letters only on the right side of the keyboard?

• Texas, left; Ohio, right

History

• Detroit: La Ville d'Etroit, or "city of the strait," was founded by Antoine de la Mothe, Sieur de Cadillac, a French fur trader (1701)
• Brigham Young: seeking a safe haven, the Mormon leader and his followers arrived in the valley of the Great Salt Lake, in what is now Utah (1847)
• kitchen debate: US vice president Richard Nixon and Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev debated the merits of capitalism vs. communism in a replica of an American kitchen, set up at the American National Exhibition in Moscow (1959)
• Watergate: the US Supreme Court ordered President Richard Nixon to turn over incriminating subpoenaed White House recordings (1974)

Birthdays

• Símon Bolívar (1783-1830): "The Liberator" of South America
• Alexandre Dumas (1802-1870): author of The Three Musketeers; plus, writers Tanizaki Jun'ichirō (1886-1965), Robert Graves (1895-1985) and John D. MacDonald (1916-1986)
• Amelia Earhart (1897-1937): pilot who disappeared over the S. Pacific while attempting to circumnavigate the globe; plus, women's rights activist Bella Abzug (1920-1998)
• Pat Oliphant (75): award-winning political cartoonist
• Karl Malone (47): NBA hall-of-famer; also, slugger Barry Bonds (46)
• Anna Paquin (28): Rogue in the X-Men movies and Sookie Stackhouse on True Blood; also, actors John Aniston (77), Dan Hedaya (70), Chris Sarandon (68), Robert Hays (63), Michael Richards (61), Lynda Carter (59), Kristin Chenoweth and Laura Leighton (both 42), Jennifer Lopez (41), Eric Szmanda (35), Rose Byrne (31), Summer Glau (29) and Elisabeth Moss (28)