A harrow is an agricultural implement – a heavy wooden rake that is dragged over plowed land to break up and smooth the surface. In a figurative sense, we use harrowing to describe something that ravages, plunders; causes extreme pain or distress. As I used it today: “I’ll be in Myrtle Beach for a week in October, a yearly get-together with some life-long friends, playing golf, watching football, talking shit, and reminiscing. We’ll rehash old stories about the halcyon days of high school. And there may be some private conversations about the harrowing days in Vietnam.”

Anosognosia – a Greek word that roughly translates to “without knowledge of disease” – is a condition that affects how people view themselves and impairs their awareness of their health symptoms. (See “Interesting…” above.)

A denizen – from the Latin for “from within” – is an inhabitant or occupant of a particular place. As I used it today: “At a total of 4,000 new denizens, New York City is not even close to giving sanctuary to its ‘fair share’ of those crossing the border each year.”

Au fond (oh FAWN) – a French term – literally means “at the bottom.” It’s used as a highfalutin synonym for “fundamentally,” “essentially,” or “in reality.” As used by Margaret Atwood in The Testaments: “Some days I see myself as the Recording Angel, collecting together all the sins of Gilead, including mine; on other days I shrug off this high moral tone. Am I not, au fond, merely a dealer in sordid gossip?”

a word to the wise

Scintillating – from the Latin scintilla, meaning “spark” – is another way to say glittering; brilliantly and excitingly clever or skillful. (See today’s P.S., below.)

Slumgullion – believed to be derived from “slum” (an old word for “slime”) and “gullion” (“mud” or “cesspool”) – was used by miners during the California gold rush to describe the muddy slurry left behind after washing gold. By the turn of the 20th century, it was used to describe a weak, tasteless beverage or stew. From Roughing It by Mark Twain: “Then he poured for us a beverage he called ‘Slumgullion.’ And it is hard to think he was not inspired when he named it. It really pretended to be tea, but there was too much dish-rag, and sand, and old bacon-rind in it to deceive….”

A busker – possibly from the Spanish buscar, meaning “to seek” – is someone who makes a living by passing the hat while entertaining in the street or another public place, often by playing a musical instrument. (See today’s P.S., below.)

Verisimilitude is the appearance of being true or real. As I used it today in my review of Argo. “The movie has a docudrama feeling that, while not overbearing, does add to the verisimilitude and urgency of every scene.”

A behemoth (buh-HEE-moth) – from the Hebrew for “beast” – is something that is enormous, especially a big and powerful organization. In the Old Testament, the behemoth was a beast from the Book of Job – a primeval chaos-monster (king of the animals of dry land), the counterpart of the leviathan (king of the animals of the water). As I used it today in the brief about US / China relations: “We now find ourselves watching our politicians discuss the possibility of war against not one, but two military behemoths.”

An auteur (oh-TUR) – French for “originator” – is a filmmaker whose personal influence and artistic control are so great that he/she is regarded as the movie’s author. As I used it in my review of France, above: “[I liked all the things the movie didn’t do], including make clear the auteur’s view of French media and its darlings.”