Happy National Dictionary Day! Today, Oct. 16, happens to be the birthday of Noah Webster the original lexicographer (someone who crafts, compiles, writes and edits dictionaries).
So, how does someone celebrate National Dictionary Day?
Here's a few ideas:
What is the first word you flip to upon opening a dictionary?
First word to find when flipping open Webster's II New Riverside Dictionary :
Nincompoop - a silly person
What is one of your favorite words? Look up the meaning for the word.
One of my favorite words:
Bliss - great happiness, joy
What is your favorite definition of a word?
A favorite meaning for a word:
Serendipity - the faculty of discovering desirable or valuable things accidentally or unexpectedly. A "happy accident" or "pleasant surprise" - the act of finding something good or useful while not searching for it.
Serendipity happens to be the title to one of my favorite movies. The 2001 movie casts John Cusack and Kate Beckinsale who test fate to see if destiny will bring them back together after a magical first meeting set during the Christmas season in New York. The movie poses the question, "Can once in a lifetime happen more than once?" The couple reunite years after the night they first met and fell in love by always holding onto the belief that one day they'd end up together as they were "meant to be".
For inspiration check out Ben Zimmer's 30 Great American Words list. He gives us a run-down of fascinating words, their origins and meanings. I loved learning that the word "dude" used so commonly by my 13-year old originated in the 1880's to describe "fashionable young men" or that my daughter's famous reply of "okay" dates back to 1839 when it was playfully spelled as "OK" in a Boston Morning Post article and originally stood for "oll korrect"
Go play Wild Words Spelling Bee that challenges you to spell a word that is pronounced online. My first word was triskaidekaphobia (a morbid fear of the number 13), and no, I did not get the answer correct on the first guess (I was 4 letters off)!
If you need a little refresher on the most frequently misspelled words (misspell being one of the words) or the homonyms most often misused (the list includes elicit vs. illicit, capital vs. capitol, their vs. there) or the most commonly confused words (affect vs. effect, than vs. then, moot vs. mute) check out the Merriam-Webster Spell It site.
Feeling pretty confident about your spelling and vocabulary skill set? Check out the 2013 study guide for the National Spelling Bee with a comprehensive list of over 1,150 words divided into sections by language of origin.
Play Fictionary, the Dictionary Game which is similar to Balderdash but can be played with just a dictionary, paper and pencils. Players attempt to determine the real definition of obscure words. Here is an online list of obscure words to get you started. While playing once with a group of friends in college (yes, I was a journalism major so these games were especially appealing to me), the correct definition of the word (which that word escapes me now) described the body odor of someone while playing poker! When the word was read, we were all in hysterics thinking the player who tried to "bluff" that word definitely didn't comprehend the strategy in the game. Obviously, no one was able to nab the correct answer for that one!
Whether you celebrate dictionaries, definitions or words - give thanks to Mr. Webster and his years of service in giving us all one of the most utilized resource books of all-time!
