A Word a Day Keeps the Doctor Away: Lade

About This Blog

I love language. I enjoy playing with words and even, yes, reading dictionaries, thesauruses and style manuals.

Last fall, when I was motivating myself to write again, I recalled some advice from a very wise English teacher who told me that one of the keys to learning new vocabulary was to make the words relevant.

I thought that would be an excellent daily writing exercise for myself, so I started a daily blog on my MySpace blog with a word of the day. After the traditional definition, synonyms and usage blurbs, I added a section called "Relevance to My life," in which I'd use the word in a description of some aspect of my life.

Occasionally I'd add "What it is NOT" entries and video clips, some of which were directly relevant, and others which resulted from my stream-of-consciousness train of thought.

I hope that you enjoy them!

Thursday, March 26, 2009

Lade

The Word of the Day for March 26 is "lade."

lade: (verb)
Fill or place a load on.

To burden or oppress; weigh down.

Synonyms: load

Usage: The captain ordered his crew to lade the ship with provisions and weapons before they embarked on their expedition.

Relevance to my life: If my kids had their way, on our trips to Price Chopper, they would lade the cart with nothing but doughnuts, cookies and chips instead of the bags of vegetables I pick.

Evolution of Shopping Carts
This was... odd. I enjoyed his use of back formation to get the verb "evolute." Clever. lol