Word of the Day – Valetudinarian

I had to chuckle at this one. I was reading it while at the doctor’s office.

Noun:
A person who is excessively concerned about his or her poor health or ailments. An invalid.

Adjective:
In poor health; sickly; invalid.
excessively concerned about one’s poor health or ailments.
Of, relating to, or characterized by invalidism.

Origin:
Valetudinarian stems from the Latin word for “state of health,” valētūdō, which in turn derives from the verb valēre, “to be well.” It entered English in the late 1600s.

Kakistocracy

Noun (kak-uh-stok-ruh-see)

Government by the worst persons; a form of government in which the worst persons are in power.

Example:
Burt Wheeler arrived in Washington as a Senator in 1923, when the backwash of war and prohibition had brought America about as near to kakistocracy as it has ever come.
Hubert Kay, “Burton K. Wheeler,” Life, May 19, 1941

Origin:
Kakistocracy entered English in the early 1800s from the Greek word kákistos meaning “worst,” and -cracy, a combining form meaning “rule” or “government.”

Snickersnee

noun (snik-er-snee)

A knife, especially one used as a weapon.

Example:
Oh, never shall I / Forget the cry, / Or the shriek that shriekèd he, / As I gnashed my teeth, / When from its sheath / I drew my snickersnee!
W. S. Gilbert, The Mikado, 1885

Origin:
Snickersnee is a variant of the earlier snick or snee, which in turn comes from the Dutch steken meaning “to stick” and snijden meaning “to cut.”

Enervate

Verb: (en-er-veyt)

To deprive of force or strength; destroy the vigor of; weaken.

Blarney: Flattering or wheedling talk; cajolery.

noun (blahr-ney)

Deceptive or misleading talk; nonsense; hooey.

Example: A lot of blarney about why he was broke.

Origin:
Blarney came to English in the mid-1700s from the name of the hamlet in Ireland, where a stone in Blarney Castle is said to impart skill in flattery to anyone who kisses it.

Afebrile: adjective (ey-fee-bruhl)

Without fever; feverless.

Astraphobia: noun (as-truh-foh-bee-uh)

An abnormal fear of thunder and lightning.