A New Word, Every Now and Then

I started reading Maureen Dowd's column 'Liberties' on the NYT Op-Ed page I guess almost as soon as she landed there under that heading. After only a few columns I realized that despite her light work load of only producing two columns a week, she nearly always had a word in a column that I had to look up. My vocabulary is actually pretty good, even if I say so myself, but Ms. Dowd would still send me scurrying to the dictionary. The one that's in books.

I only now occasionally read Ms. Dowd, not because of having to haul out a dictionary (my choice, I know there are easier ways), but because I wearied of what she was writing about and how. But that's not the point.

Every so often I would take in a column because it started off with interest, and finished while still making sense. And sure enough, she still sent me to a dictionary.

I finally decided to do a blog posting of words from her columns that I had to look up. So far, I've only managed two words, from two columns. This is because of inattentive reading on my part, but now also exacerbated by a footnote I read on the Op-Ed page that Ms. Dowd would now appear in Sunday's paper only. Thus, once a week. For several reasons, I don't get Sunday's NYT.

Once a week. I remember reading something Russell Baker wrote, perhaps even after he retired, that he was surprised to see columnists appear only twice a week, unlike the three deadlines he faced each working week for many, many years. I always thought he might have been taking aim at Ms. Dowd's light twice weekly schedule. Which is now a once a week schedule. (Her column took over Baker's space on his retirement.)

I've read Ms. Dowd say she spends seven hours a day on her columns. Perfectly believable. What I'll miss at this point is the Wednesday glance at finding a word I might not know. Here are the two I recently mined. And just for fun, after these two, I'm going to scan the most recent Sunday column and see if another one pops up.

Ms. Dowd writing about the possible Metropolitan Opera strike:

"Doubtless the Met Workers have Nibelungen fatigue." Does the pharmacy industry know about this? I haven't head this one described during a Yankee game. Is it a new diagnosis for loss of bladder control? Do I have it?

Rest easy. It's Ms. Dowd clever reference to the followers of Siegfried who stole the gold from the subterranean race of dwarfs ruled over by Nibelung. It all dates to a German epic, 'Nibelungenlied.'

The translation is made a bit simpler when in the following text Ms. Dowd tells us that the workers are pissed at Peter Gelb, the Met general manager, who spent $19 million dollars on a 45-ton set of movable planks to stage Wagner's 'Ring' cycle. (From what I saw of this in the news, it allowed performers to be pulled up vertically.) And then there's the $169,000 for poppies in 'Prince Igor.'

Ms. Dowd writing about the Republicans' lawsuit against President Obama:

"The Republicans go absolutely nuts and realize that their lawsuit, the mini-me of impeachment will not..."

No straightforward definition of 'mini-me' in the OED (shorter version). But, we can divine the meaning easy enough from knowing the prefix 'mini': small. Thus, somewhat like Bill Cosby's very early-in-his-career routine of having his tonsils out as a kid and laying on the gurney and wanting ice cream and yelling to anyone who walked by, "Hey you, almost a doctor..." Almost an impeachment. Easy enough, when you think about it.

Checking Ms. Dowd's most recent Sunday column (online)...

Ms. Dowd writes about President Obama and his take on social media:

"...and his adamantine belief that his Solomonic wisdom...

Adamantine means "rigidly firm."

Not bad, but nowhere near as colorful as "Nibelungen fatigue." I'm going to miss Maureen on Wednesdays.