Daily Content Archive
(as of Friday, February 22, 2019)| Word of the Day | |||||||
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belly-up
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| Daily Grammar Lesson | |
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Using "If Only" Instead of "Wish"To express a desire that is more fanciful, unrealistic, or that we consider to be ideal, we can use "if only" instead of "I wish" to add more emphasis to the desire. In this construction, what happens to the subjunctive verb? More... | |
| Article of the Day | |
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 The ManananggalThe manananggal is a mythical creature of Filipino folklore usually described as an older woman capable of severing her upper body from her lower half and then taking flight with huge bat-like wings. The creature is said to hunt at night, sucking the blood of its unsuspecting victims with its proboscis-like tongue. Like vampires, the manananggal detests garlic, and smearing it on its lower body while the upper part is away will result in the creature's death. How does one become a manananggal? More... | |
| This Day in History | |
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 Adams-Onís Treaty: Spain Sells Florida to the US (1819)In the early 1800s, tensions between the US and Spain were increasing over border disputes in North America. With Spanish power in the New World declining, it was widely believed that Spain would lose land to the US. The Adams-Onís Treaty settled the dispute by attempting to draw clearer borders, roughly granting Florida and Louisiana to the US while giving everything west of Louisiana to Spain. The US did not pay Spain directly for the new land. Instead, it compensated Spain in what way? More... | |
| Today's Birthday | |
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.png) Robert Stephenson Smyth Baden-Powell (1857)Powell was a British army officer and founder of the Boy Scouts and Girl Guides, later the Girl Scouts. He was a hero of the South African War and author of Aids to Scouting, a military textbook. Upon learning that his book was being used to train boys in woodcraft, he wrote Scouting for Boys and established the Boy Scout movement in 1908. In 1910, with his sister and wife, he founded the Girl Guides. What disguise did Powell use while gathering information in war? More... | |
| Quotation of the Day | |
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 It wasn't until late in life that I discovered how easy it is to say "I don't know."W. Somerset Maugham (1874-1965) | |
| Idiom of the Day | |
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make matters worse— To make an already bad, unpleasant, or difficult situation even more so. (Sometimes used as an independent clause in the infinitive form: "to make matters worse.") More... | |
| Today's Holiday | |
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 St. Lucia Independence Day (2025)The West Indies island of St. Lucia celebrates its national independence holiday on February 22. On that day in 1979, the country gained full independence from Britain. St. Lucia had been a British Colony since 1814. More... | |
| Word Trivia | |
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Today's topic: operaopera - Actually the Latin plural of opus, "labor, work." More... prima donna - Meaning "principal female singer in an opera," it is from the same Italian phrase meaning "first lady"; the meaning "temperamental person" was first recorded in 1834. More... primo vomo - The principal male singer in an opera. More... soap opera - Goes back (1939) to the early days of radio suspense serials, which were mainly sponsored by soap-makers; the "opera" part is an echo of the earlier "horse opera"—a Western (1927). More... | |