#86

slugabed \SLUHG-uh-bed\, noun:
One who stays in bed until a late hour; a sluggard.

Nemecek's business is not for slugabeds. He opens for business every weekday at 4 a.m.
-- Drew Fetherston, "He Can Really Make Pigs Fly", Newsday, December 12, 1994

I found Oriana, as usual, up before me, for I always was a sad slugabed.
-- W. Hurton, Doomed Ship

All save Whit elected to sleep in that morning. Whit came back to report that he had spotted the tracks of a doe and a fawn made in the new snow directly beneath my unoccupied stand, and I regretted being a slugabed.
-- "Paying Tribute to Deer in Minnesota Woods", New York Times, December 6, 1998

Slugabed is from slug, "sluggard" + abed, "in bed."

#66

scrabble \SKRAB-uhl\, intransitive verb:

1. To scrape or scratch with the hands or feet.
2. To struggle by or as if by scraping or scratching.
3. To proceed by clawing with the hands and feet; to scramble.
4. To make irregular, crooked, or unmeaning marks; to scribble; to scrawl.

transitive verb:
1. To mark with irregular lines or letters; to scribble on or over.
2. To make or obtain by scraping together hastily.

noun:
1. The act or an instance of scrabbling.
2. A scribble.

Mice kept me awake by scrabbling in the uncovered garbage can.
-- Edith Anderson, Love in Exile

Rather frantically I scrabble for the recollection of what exactly it does give me.
-- Robert McLiam Wilson, Ripley Bogle

In the huddle they'd talk about running "post patterns," and they'd scrabble plays in the grass.
-- George Plimpton, quoted in The Last Patrician, by Michael Knox Beran

Heard by Maidment but not seen, the dog, called Rosie, yawned, then pushed herself on to her feet, slipping about on the polished boards with a scrabble of paws.
-- William Trevor, Death in Summer


Scrabble derives from Dutch schrabbelen, from Middle Dutch, frequentative of schrabben, "to scrape; to scratch."





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#15

en·ve·lope [en-vuh-lohp, ahn-] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation
–noun
1.
a flat paper container, as for a letter or thin package, usually having a gummed flap or other means of closure.
2.
something that envelops; a wrapper, integument, or surrounding cover.
3.
Biology. a surrounding or enclosing structure, as a corolla or an outer membrane.
4.
Geometry. a curve or surface tangent to each member of a set of curves or surfaces.
5.
Radio. (of a modulated carrier wave) a curve connecting the peaks of a graph of the instantaneous value of the electric or magnetic component of the carrier wave as a function of time.
6.
the fabric structure enclosing the gasbag of an aerostat.
7.
the gasbag itself.
8.
Electronics. the airtight glass or metal housing of a vacuum tube.
9.
the technical limits within which an aircraft or electronic system may be safely operated.
—Idiom
10.
push the envelope, to stretch established limits, as in technological advance or social innovation.
Also, envelop.



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#8

flummox \FLUM-uhks\, transitive verb:
To confuse; to perplex.

And when a poll's results happen to upset the conventional wisdom, orconfound the experts, or flummox the pundits, then that's a poll toremember.
-- Michael Kagay, "Unexpected Results Make for Memorable Polls", New York Times, March 23, 2000

The chronological order of the Stuart, Hanover, Lancaster and TudorBritish royal houses had me flummoxed.
-- Sara Ivry, "Game Show Wannabe: I Coulda Been a Millionaire", New York Times, February 27, 2000

Flummoxed by the surreality of history and the mind-bogglingchanges unleashed by the 60's, many writers in that era became minimalists,withdrawing, turtlelike, inside their own homes and heads.
-- Michiko Kakutani, "New Wave of Writers Reinvents Literature", New York Times, April 22, 2000


The origin of flummox is unknown.

from dictionary.com

#6

For some reason unknown, today's theme is MEAT.

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meat [meet] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation
–noun
1.
the flesh of animals as used for food.
2.
the edible part of anything, as a fruit or nut: Crack the walnuts and remove the meats.
3.
the essential point or part of an argument, literary work, etc.; gist; crux: The meat of the play is the jealousy between the two brothers.
4.
solid food: meat and drink.
5.
solid or substantial content; pith: The article was full of meat, with few wasted words.
6.
a favorite occupation, activity, etc.: Chess in his meat.
7.
Chiefly South Midland and Southern U.S. pork, esp. bacon.
8.
Slang: Vulgar. penis.
9.
Archaic. the principal meal: to say grace before meat.
—Idiom
10.
piece of meat, Slang.
a.
a person regarded merely as a sex object.
b.
a person, as a prizefighter or laborer, regarded merely as a strong or useful physical specimen.

[Origin: bef. 900; ME, OE mete food, c. OHG maz, ON matr, Goth mats]

—Related forms
meatless, adjective

from dictionary.com