Wednesday, 30 July 2014

AU REVOIR

AU REVOIR
- Good-bye until we meet again.
- Used to express farewell.

Image Credits : BK

Usage:
- She ended it with: "Good bye is an unhappy word. I prefer au revoir."

Tuesday, 22 July 2014

Labyrinth

Labyrinth
- A complicated irregular network of passages or paths in which it is difficult to find one’s way.
- An intricate and confusing arrangement.

A Labyrinth
Image Credits : David Goehring
Usage :
- Throughout this distance the river is a hopeless labyrinth of rocks, islands, reefs and rapids.
- Lana suspected the labyrinth of tunnels and chambers ran beneath the entire town.
- A labyrinth of conflicting laws and regulations.

Monday, 21 July 2014

Stampede

#113
Stampede
- A sudden panicked rush of a number of horses, cattle, or other animals.
- Wild rush in a sudden mass panic.

Image Credits : Gopal Vijayaraghavan 

Usage:
- In addition to the four men hurt in the shooting, two women were hurt in the stampede for the exits that followed the attack.
- There will be a stampede of Indian companies going to the markets and trying to reduce leverage and to take advantage.


Thursday, 17 July 2014

Amicus Curiae

Amicus Curiae
-Literally, friend of the court.
- An impartial adviser to a court of law in a particular case.

A court room gavel.
Image Credits : Brain Turner
Usage :
- Senior advocate  Subramanium may reconsider his continuation as amicus curiae in the Padmanabhaswamy temple case.
- The Court then appointed former Solicitor General TR as amicus curiae for this case.

Monday, 14 July 2014

Sleep Like A Log

#111
Sleep like a log
- To sleep very soundly.
- To sleep heavily, long and without disturbance.

Origin:
This probably originated from the days of lumberjacks who used basic tools to bring down trees and then cut them into logs of different sizes. This required a lot of physical effort and the men slept soundly due to sheer exhaustion. As logs are large blocks of wood, they aren't easily movable. Possibly the lumberjacks would term their deep sleep as what the log does - no movement - and hence the term 'to sleep like a log'!

Image Credits : Pune Getaways

Usage:
- With a full stomach and a warm blanket, I slept like a log.
- I slept like a log until morning.

Friday, 11 July 2014

White Collar Vs Blue Collar

#110

White Collar:
- A white-collar worker is a person who performs professional, managerial, or administrative work.

Blue Collar:
- Blue-collar work may involve skilled or unskilled manufacturing, mining, mechanical, maintenance, technical installation and many other types of physical work.

Professional, managerial, or administrative work is considered as White-Collar job
Image Credits : 
llee_wu 

Workers unchain girder from delivery truck
Image Credits : 
Washington State Dept of Transportation 

Origin:
A blue collar worker refers to the fact that most manual laborers at the turn of the century wore blue shirts, which could hold a little dirt around the collar without standing out.

This working class stands in contrast to white collar workers, which historically have had the higher-paying, salaried positions to go with their clean and pressed white shirts.

Usage:
- Aussie senator calls for commission on white-collar crimes.
- Very few applicants for blue-collar jobs in SF.

Thursday, 10 July 2014

Coterie

Coterie
- A small exclusive group of friends or people with common interests.
- An exclusive circle of people with a common purpose

Image Credits : Roger Price
Usage:
- His films are admired by a small coterie of critics.
- He still drives himself to work in the morning, surrounded by a coterie of security guards.

Friday, 4 July 2014

Pet Peeve

108
Pet Peeve
- A frequent subject of complaint.
- An irritating experience caused by others in which you cannot control.

This is my pet peeve, too many drivers on the road are distracted with cell phones.
Image Credits : 
Paul Oka
Usage:
- Grammatical mistakes are his pet peeve.
- One of my biggest pet peeves is people driving too slowly on the highway.

Thursday, 3 July 2014

USURP

#107
USURP
- To seize and held by force, without legal authority.
- To commit forcible or illegal seizure of an office, power, etc.

Image Credits : originalpozer

Usage:
- Congress accuses government of usurping independence of judiciary.
- Some people have accused city council members of trying to usurp the mayor's power.
- The magazine usurped copyrighted material.

Wednesday, 2 July 2014

Devour

106
Devour
- Eat hungrily or quickly.
- To destroy, consume, or waste.



Usage:
- He devoured half of his burger in one bite.
- The hungry flames devoured the old house.

Tuesday, 1 July 2014

Dexterity

105
Dexterity
- Skill in performing tasks, especially with the hands.
- Readiness and grace in physical activity

Some examples of the extreme dexterity of mountain goats, who scale steep rock sides to lick salty limestone.
Image Credits :  Adriano Migliorati
Usage :
- The amazing dexterity of the acrobat.
- His record testifies to a certain dexterity in politics.