New Words, and Other Finds

I went back to the sporting goods place and found a more liberal clerk to trade in my hand exerciser. This time I got a receipt for $9.99 instead of $7.99, and all because I didn't show her my receipt. As a bonus, the cashier was an even prettier redhead than the previous one I had the pleasure of dealing with, although I felt bad making her have to process the return. It was more complicated than it had to be, b/c she issued me a gift card and immediately depleted its balance back to zero. I guess it's a learning experience for her.

I got some duds to wear to this dance I'm going to tomorrow at a slick thrift store in Bessemer. I'll have to take pictures. Basically I'm going as somebody I'm not, or maybe somebody I would've been if I wasn't who I am. Anyway, I'm gonna dance, and it's about time, too.

I've started reading Catch-22, first in a checked-out copy and then one I found at the thrift store. I also got a cookbook that I'm told even I can follow, a book on shorthand (I need to learn an obsolescent skill to maintain my retro-dork certification), a copy of Animal Farm, and A Tale of Two Cities (among my top three all-time favorites).

I decided to look up another batch of words that I didn't recognize, or that I didn't have a denotation in mind for. They are posted below to benefit the interested and aggravate the disinterested.

bradawl
buxom
cerulean
cloth-head
congenial
elfin
escutcheon
fog
forelock
furgle
genial
gentian
heavy weather
infundibuliform
jocose
lissom
lorgnette
messuage
nile-green
noblesse oblige
pensive
poesy
popinjay
portentous
pouch
pretentious
prolix
rarefy
scraggy
seamy
skittle-sharp
stoic
strident
supra
votary
winsome