Showing posts with label Barron's GRE. Show all posts
adenoidal \ad-n-OID-l\, adjective
1. Being characteristically pinched and nasal in tone quality.
2. Of or pertaining to the adenoids; adenoid.
3. Having the adenoids enlarged, especially to a degree that interferes with normal breathing.
"Quite the good, old-fashioned type of servant," as Miss Marple explained afterward, and with the proper, inaudible, respectful voice, so different from the loud but adenoidal accents of Gladys.
-- Agatha Christie, Three Blind Mice
Then just as suddenly the sensation was gone and I heard a shrill, adenoidal voice that swallowed most of its soft consonants…
-- Charles Johnson, Middle Passage
Adenoidal only entered English in the 1910s, referring to the glands near the nasal passage.
apoplectic
apoplectic \ap-uh-plek-tik\, adjective
1. Intense enough to threaten or cause a stroke.
2. Of or pertaining to apoplexy.
3. Having or inclined to apoplexy.
noun:
1. A person having or predisposed to apoplexy.
When Abie used to shout, Rebecca always used to make a joke that he was having one of his apoplectic fits.
-- Alan Grayson, Mile End
...four years, one recession and a host of battles — over financial regulation and the nomination of Elizabeth Warren, over Dodd-Frank and the Buffett Rule — have taken their toll. Some on Wall Street are apoplectic. One former supporter, Dan Loeb, compared Obama to Nero; the president’s enemies insinuated worse.
-- Nicholas Confessore, "Obama’s Not-So-Hot Date With Wall Street", The New York Times Magazine, May 2, 2012
Apoplectic stems from the Greek word apoplektikós which meant "pertaining to stroke". It literally meant "struck down".
agita
agita \AJ-i-tuh\, noun
1. Agitation; anxiety.
2. Heartburn; indigestion.
And my being named after the patron saint of love, St. Valentine, when I've had nothing but agita in romance just makes it more painfully ironic.
-- Rosanna Chiofalo, Bellla Fortuna
I'm eighty-two years old and I don't need this agita in my life!
-- Rita Lakin, Getting Old Is Murder
Agita was coined in America in the 1980s. It comes from the Italian word agitare meaning "to bother."