Category: words, words, words

Assignation (noun): "appointment, meeting, especially a secret rondezvous."

Heard: In a remarkable display of tact by my friend Sara Ivry during an interview for Nextbook with Tania Grossinger. Ms. Grossinger grew up at Grossinger’s, the famed Catskills resort. "Assignation" referred to the secret doings of the guests.

Ms. Grossinger has written a memoir called Growing up at Grossinger’s about the resort’s golden age in the 1940s and 50s.

Succor (noun): "Help, relief, aid."

Seen: Ironically, in this obituary of iron-hearted North Carolina Senator Jesse Helms.

Claret (adj): A dark, purplish red. (via Jennifer Traig)

Vulgate (noun): Commonly accepted speech, the vernacular.

Seen: In Nick Paumgarten’s amazing New Yorker article on elevators.

Planchets (noun): "A flat metal disk used for stamping out coins. A coin blank"

Can I just tell you how much I love words invented for a purpose as specific as this? (via a lovely article on pennies in The New Yorker)

Now that I’ve completed my annual assessment of SXSW, I can proceed with processing the neutron bomb of content and tidbits acquired and overheard that week. I’ll head those posts "Found at SXSW", "Heard at SXSW", "Lost in a Wrestling Match to at SXSW" or something like that. Anything over the next few weeks that doesn’t have that in the headline assume has nothing to do with those two nutball weeks in Austin.

Girlfriend is talking to buddy on AIM who expressed that he has a Chia Pet but no seeds for it.

This unfortunate set of circumstances he called "A major wah."

I agree.

Fantasia (noun): "A medley of familiar themes."

Seen: In Maya Angelou’s Singin’, Swingin’ and Gettin’ Merry Like Christmas which I’m reading at the moment.

Palaver (noun): "A conference or discussion."

Spotted: In Greil Marcus’s The Shape of Things to Come which I just finished reading.

Bloviating (verb): "pompously discussing at length"

Spotted: As uttered by my friend Kevin at dinner this evening.