Monday, May 25, 2009

Ochre, mint, hazel

Two bear cubs playing near the feet of their mother caught his eye, ochre, mint and hazel tumbling as they rolled and laughed in their native tongue. [2, p. 201]

Ochre is a shade of brown, while mint is a light shade of green, and hazel is, well, it's supposed to be a "golden brown" color as per definition. Hazel is supposed to be the color of a hazelnut, but a Google image search for hazel eyes reveals images of eyes that look a little more green than hazel to me. I dasnt try to settle the situation.

Sunday, May 24, 2009

Shaomai, ugali, nipla, kori bananje

"And I enjoy food--a lot. Nothing like a little shaomai, ugali, nipla, or kori bananje to make your taste buds happy..." [2, p. 201]

Shaomai are Chinese dumplings served in dim sum, ugali is an East African food item made of maize that can have the consistency of porridge or dough. I could not find definitive answers on what nipla or kori bananje are. I think kori bananje is some type of Indian dish with curry and chicken, and I can only guess that nipla is some kind of African dish.

Chided

"Mackenzie!" she chided, her words flowing with affection. [2, p. 199]

To chide is to show disapproval of or to scold.

Eddies, whorls, prow

At one point he turned to watch eddies and whorls made by the oar blade and stern and when he turned back, Sarayu was sitting in the prow, looking at him. [2, p. 197]

An eddy is a current that's going in a different direction from the main current within a medium, such as water in a lake or even a body of gas. Just think of a small whirlpool, if you like.

A whorl is something with radial symmetry, but the things arranged along the central axis need not be perpendicular to the axis. Think of a pinwheel. Whorl is also associated with things in a spiral formation. Another word for a whorl is a verticil.

The prow is simply the front part of a boat or ship. In this context, it is also also known as the bow.

Countermand

So whose choices should we countermand, Mackenzie? [2, p. 193]

To countermand means to put a stop to something by an order contradictory to the action that initiated the thing that is being stopped. Bit confusing? It just means to put a stop to something.

Grotto

He now realized that the walls of the cave had dissolved around him, and he was standing in a grotto behind the waterfall. [2, p. 171]

A grotto is a cave or cavern; I'm not sure if there is an actual distinction between a regular old cave and a grotto, though. But if you do a Google image search, it mostly turns up images of caves that are next to shorelines and filled with water. I suppose it is safe to assume that a grotto is a watery cave due to being near a body of water.

Luciano Pavarotti

He thought, I'm Mickey Mouse about to speak to Pavarotti. [2, p. 155]

Luciano Pavarotti is probably the most famous operatic singer of all time. I'm sure he's been caricatured countless times by numerous cartoons and artists, as he is the quintessential image of an opera singer. If I say opera singer, you will probably think of Luciano Pavarotti, or at least a caricature of him. I feel like listening to some of his music now :)

Coalesced, regal

And then he jumped when the light coalesced on one spot, and he finally saw her. Behind the desk sat a tall, beautiful, olive-skinned woman with chiseled Hispanic features, clothed in a dark-colored flowing robe. She sat as straight and regal as a high court judge. [2, p. 154]

Coalescing is when things grow or come together to form one mass or body.

Regal refers to kingly or royal-appearing, or stately and refined looking things or persons.

Mica

He looked down and was relieved to see a faint reflection off a surface--not the dirt and rock of the tunnel, but a floor; smooth and dark like polished mica. [2, p. 154]

Mica is a type of rock made up of hydrous silicates of aluminum, and it is usually translucent. It is also known as isinglass. Just think of Superman's Fortress of Solitude.

Impasse

Mack followed the trail that wound past the waterfall, away from the lake, and through a dense patch of cedar trees. It took less than five minutes to reach an impasse. [2, p. 153]

An impasse is a situation with no way out, be it because of a physical or rhetorical barrier.

Osprey

Jesus paused to watch an osprey dive into the lake not fifty feet from them and slowly take flight again, talons gripping a large lake trout still struggling to escape. [2, p. 148]

An osprey is a large type of hawk that feeds on fish.

Orchard

They were in an area that could have been an orchard, but not really. [2, p. 132]

An orchard is a plot of land devoted to growing fruit or nut trees.

Currant, vermilion, tangerine, chartreuse, platinum, fuchsia

Without speaking a word, he tried to follow Sarayu from place to place within the garden but found himself easily distracted by the blends of colors: currant and vermilion reds, tangerine and chartreuse divided by platinum and fuchsia, as well as innumerable shades of greens and browns. [2, pp. 131-132]

A currant is a little round berry of maroon-ish pink-ish color that grows on shrubs of the genus Ribes. In the case above, however, they are clearly referring to the color of currants.

This is what the colors look like:

Currant   
Vermilion   
Tangerine   
Chartreuse   or   
Platinum   
Fuchsia   


Somehow, this table doesn't do any of those colors any justice. Seeing these colors in real life is quite a different experience, as they are all colors I consider to be dramatic. Note, also, that there is a distinction between "web chartreuse" (which appears lime green-ish), and traditional chartreuse, which is more yellow.

Transfixed

Mack sat transfixed as he watched Jesus kiss his Father's hands and then look deeply into his Father's eyes and finally say,"Papa, I loved watching you today as you made yourself fully available to take Mack's pain into yourself and then gave him space to choose his own timing." [2, p. 109]

Being transfixed means not moving because you've been struck by awe, and are unable to do anything but look.

Gardenia, jasmine, precariously

It was the smell of flowers with overtones of gardenia and jasmine, unmistakably his mother's perfume that he kept hidden away in his little tin box. He had already been perched precariously on the precipice of emotion, and now the flooding scent and attendant memories staggered him. [2, p. 85]

Gardenia refers to any tree or shrub that belongs to the genus Gardenia, or the flowers that grow from them. I don't know that they have one characteristic smell, but a Google search turns up pictures of white flowers. So if they all produce white flowers for the most part, then maybe they smell similar, too?

Jasmine refers to any of various plants belonging to the genus Jasminum. They usually have fragrant flowers.

Precarious refers to something that is uncertain--as in, something that may be arbitrary.

Belied, ardor

With speed that belied her size, she crossed the distance between them and engulfed him in her arms, lifting him clear off his feet and spinning him around like a little child. And all the while she was shouting his name--"Mackenzie Allen Phillips"--with the ardor of someone seeing a long-lost and deeply loved relative. [2, p. 84]

To belie is to be contradictory.

Ardor refers to great warmth or passion.

Olfactory, flitted

He had always heard that the nose was thebest link to the past, that the olfactory sense was the strongest for tapping into forgotten history, and now some long-stores remembrances of his own childhood flitted through his mind. [2, pp. 83-84]

As can be surmised from the above paragraph, olfactory refers to the sense of smell.

To flit is to pass quickly, swiftly or lightly.

Tuesday, May 5, 2009

Brush, briars, devil's club

Instead of the dark and forbidding overgrowth of brush, briars, and devil's club, everything Mack could see was not postcard perfect. [2, p. 83]

It appears that brush can be used to refer to any type of messy grouping of fauna that one wishes to describe. Apparently it can refer to dense bushes, a pile of branches, a mix of thickly growing trees and bushes, an area covered with thickly growing trees and bushes, and even a wooded region with few settlers.

Briars are also a nonspecific term for fauna, except that prickliness is implied. Briar can also refer to a messy growth of bushes and shrubs.

Devil's club refers specifically to Oplopanax horridus, a spiny type of shrub.

Cloistered

Cloistered spirituality seemed to change nothing in the lives of the people he knew, except maybe Nan. [2, p. 68]

A cloister is an architectural element consisting of an open walkway, leading to a courtyard. However, cloistered is an adjective meaning quiet and secluded, like a place for reflection.

Intelligentsia

It seemed that direct communication with God was something exclusively for the ancients and uncivilized, while educated Westerners' access to God was mediated and controlled by the intelligentsia. [2, p. 68]

The intelligentsia refers to a class of people that devotes their time to "complex mental and creative labor", with artists and school teachers being cited as examples by Wikipedia. I would argue that this is essentially the job of a philosopher, although in a modern context we don't really have people who are paid to just sit around in philosophize. Well, I suppose some people might fall into that role even in these modern times. I wouldn't mind that job! :)

Flank steak

The first meal was a Phillips family tradition: flank steak, marinated in Uncle Joe's secret sauce. [2, p. 31]

Flank steak is meat cut from the belly of the cow. This type of meat is tougher than some of the other cuts, and is therefore often marinated in order to soften it up.

Sunday, May 3, 2009

Bailiwick

My mother's punishments were another matter. The high justice was Father's bailiwick; Mother handled the low and middle--with a peach switch. Ouch! [1, p. 18]

Bailiwick means "area of jurisdiction".

Saturnalia, QED

Dagmar wasn't prepped for surgery; she (obviously!) was not about to give birth. No, she was about to take part in a saturnalia. QED. [1, p. 15]

This is an interesting one. A saturnalia is supposed to be a celebration of Saturn, the Roman god of agriculture and harvest, which was celebrated with unrestrained merrymaking. Emphasis on unrestrained. In one of my previous posts, it is mentioned that on this fantasy planet, there is a festival called Fiesta, or as we later find out, La Fiesta de Santa Carolita. It is hinted fairly strongly that this festival involves large outdoors orgies. The ancient Roman Saturnalia likely also included orgies, so the description is appropriate.

QED is a sort of acronym meaning quod erat demonstrandum, which is Latin for "which was to be demonstrated". It is used by mathematicians at the end of a proof in order to indicate that they are done, and to indicate that their initial supposition has been definitively proven correct. In this case, Heinlein posited that women who shave their pubic hair are unrestrained hedonists. He then goes on to use Dagmar as evidence of this: she is shaven down there and she is about to engage in a Saturnalia. In the previous paragraph (not quoted here), he posits that there are essentially only two other reasons why a woman's pubic hair would be shaven: in preparation for some kind of vaginal surgery, or as preparation to give birth, and that she was not about to engage in either of these activities. This leaves the only other option: unrestrained sex. Thus, he has proven his point beyond refutation, and thus ends his "proof" with QED. Thus, you can think of QED as being a synonym for "I have thus proven my point, and therefore rest my case." Dagmar is a female nurse who is about to perform a procedure on the protagonist, by the way. Because this book was published in 1987, Dagmar likely refers to Virginia Ruth Egnor (or later, Virginia Lewis, after marriage). She was a famous model/actress who played a dumb blond called Dagmar, with Dagmar being a German and Danish name meaning "dear great" and "day maid" respectively.

Hedonists

The ones who did it because they preferred that styling were without exception hearty, healthy, uninhibited hedonists [1, p. 15]

This sentence comes at the end of the paragraph that was opened by the previous sentence from the previous entry. Here, "it" and "that styling" refer to the depilation of the pubic curls. A hedonist is someone who believes that life is all about the pursuit of pleasure, and values it above all else.

Depilates

A woman who shaves or otherwise depilates her public curls has a profound interest in recreational sex. [1, p. 15]

It seems there is a word for just about everything. Depilate means to remove hair.

Thursday, April 30, 2009

Chinook

Sometime in the night an unexpected chinook blew through the Willamette Valley, freeing the landscape from the storm's icy grip, except for those things that lay hidden in the deepest shadows. [2, p. 26]

Chinook has several meanings, but in this case it refers specifically to a warm wind that blows down the eastern slopes of the Rocky Mountains. The funny thing is that Willamette Valley is to the west of the Rocky Mountains. I don't know about you, I'll let it slide.

Monday, April 27, 2009

Buffeting

Buffeting gusts of wind, which had initially slowed him, now shortened the time it took traverse the mini glacier that was thickening beneath his feet. [2, p. 19]

Although spelled the same as the food type of buffet, it is neither pronounced the same, nor does it have the same meaning. When you pronounce the "t" at the end, you are saying that someone or something is struggling or pushing against something else. In this case, Mack Phillips (the protagonist in the story) was pushing against the wind.

Mantles

The trees in the neighbor's field had all donned translucent mantles, and each now stood unique but unified in its presentation. [2, p. 18]

Mantle has many applications, depending on which discipline you're referring to--geology, clothing, or other sciences--but as a pure English word it simply refers to any type of cloak or covering.

Unbridled, bluster

When you face the force of an ice storm, you don't exactly walk boldly forward in a show of unbridled confidence. Bluster will get you battered. [2, p. 18]

When something is unbridled, it is not hindered or restrained in any way.

To bluster is to be loud and forceful. One can imagine someone with unbridled confidence being full of bluster.

Ostentation

It's a family tradition: the men all have the same first name but are commonly known by their middle names, presumably to avoid the ostentation of I, II, III or Junior and Senior. [2, p. 9]

An ostentation is a pretentious presentation or showing off of something.

The Shack

Where Tragedy Confronts Eternity
Paperback
256 pages
Publisher: Windblown Media; 1st edition (July 1, 2008)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0964729237
ISBN-13: 978-0964729230

Domino mask, gaudily, terry cloth

We ran across several hotel guests who had "jumped the gun." Most were naked save for domino masks but several wore full masks--of animals or birds, or abstract fantasy. One couple dressed most gaudily in nothing but paint. I was glad I had my terry cloth caftan. [1, p. 12]

A domino mask is the type of small mask the Robin, Batman's sidekick, would wear. It typically only covers the area around the eyes and is held in place by a strap that wraps around behind the head.

Gaudy means to be flashy or showy.

A terry cloth, or more appropriately, terrycloth (one word) is the type of fabric that most towels are made of, which consist of threads woven together in loops. This type of material, as you can imagine, is quite absorbent.

Sunday, April 26, 2009

Mezzanine

"Hmm. Interesting." He did not say another word until we reached his office suite, ten stories down on the mezzanine. [1, p. 12]

A mezzanine forms part of a larger structure known as an entresol. This is essentially an in-doors balcony. Wikipedia has some images of mezzanines: Article on the mezzanine.

Friday, April 24, 2009

Caftan

"If I were you and I was still jumpy, I would look for a big beach towel in that bathroom, and make a caftan out of it..." [1, p. 11]

A caftan is a one-piece Middle Eastern garment with really long sleeves that drapes all the way down to your feet. Just think of a poncho, only Middle Eastern, and probably a lot prettier--more highly decorated.

Proffered

The doctor put out a finger close to the little pink nose. "Howdy, Pixel." Pixel was helpful. (Sometimes he is not--a cat of firm opinions.) He sniffed the proffered finger, then licked it. [1, p. 8]

To proffer means to put something before someone to be judged for acceptance. There is a word for just about anything, isn't there?

Fasching, Carnival

This silly chatter had told me one thing: I was not in New Liverpool. New Liverpool does not celebrate Fiesta--and this local festival sounded like Fasching in Munich combined with Carnival in Rio, with a Brixton riot thrown in. [1, p.7]

Fasching is a Mari Gras celebration in Munich, Germany, while Carnival, or more properly, Carnaval, is a four-day celebration that happens in the summer time in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. It isn't analogous to Mari Gras, but it does have its origins in Pagan rituals (heck, what modern-day ritual and/or celebration isn't derived from Pagan roots?)

Brixton is a residential area of London that I guess is known for its crime, kind of like Compton, California. I could be wrong, but that's the impression I'm getting.

Thursday, April 23, 2009

Erstwhile

They stripped the top sheet off my erstwhile bedmate. The house physician looked over the cadaver without touching it, then looked more closely at that horrid red puddle--leaned down, sniffed it, then made my skin crawl by dipping a finger into the slop and tasting it. "Try it, Adolf. See what you think." [1, p. 6]

Erstwhile is a fancy way of saying "former" or "of times past". Yay, I am actually learning stuff while reading. Who would have thought that reading would lead to learning, right?

By the way, it turns out that the red puddle was actually catsup (or ketchup, if you prefer)--Heinz, not Skinner's. Gruesome pun, perhaps?

Sesquicentennial

I need not have worried about being naked; no one seemed to notice . . . which irked me. Gentlemen should at least leer. And a wolf whistle or other applause would not be out of place. Anything less makes a woman feel unsure of herself.    (Perhaps I am too sensitive. But since my sesquicentennial I have been disposed to check the mirror each morning, wondering.) [1, p. 5]

Sesqui is a prefix meaning "one and a half", and centennial of course refers to a period of 100 years. So putting the two together, you can one and a half of 100 years, which equals a period of 150 years. Ah Maureen, mother of Lazarus, long have thee lived? Still quite young even at 150 years. To Sail Beyond the Sunset is part of a series of books by Heinlein detailing his alternate universe in which there is a group of people known at the Howard families that intermarry in order to produce children who live for a very long time. My two favorites in this series are Time Enough for Love and Methusela's Children, both starring Lazarus Long, Maureen Johnson's most famous son.

Scarlet O'hara

They showed up too quickly; I was still eyeing those fireproof drapes, wondering if I could do as well with them as Scarlet O'Hara had with the drapes at Tara, or if I could arrange a simple toga, like Eunice in The Last Days of Pompeii (Or was she in Quo Vadis?), when they arrived... [1, p. 5]

Scarlet O'Hara was the main character from Gone With the Wind, and she owns a plantation called Tara. She makes a dress out of drapes in order to look like she is not destitute in order to impress some guy. The Last Days of Pompeii is a book written by Edward Bulwer-Lytton, and it, of course, depicts the last days of Pompeii before the eruption.

To answer Heinlein's question, Eunice was in Quo Vadis, or more properly, Quo Vadis: A Narrative of the Time of Nero. Quo Vadis is a Latin phrase that means "Where are you going?" In the Bible, Peter asks this question to Jesus, to which he replies to Peter that he is going to Rome to be crucified again. The book, which is a historical novel about Nero, was written by Henryk Sienkiewicz. Eunice is a fictional character in the book who is a slave and who falls in love with her master. Heinlein was far too worldly, as I've never read any of these classics, and lack the willpower to even attempt them. Some day, perhaps?

Der Ring des Nibelungen

This time they gave me background music while I waited . . . and waited--through the first two operas of the Ring Cycle and well into the third-- [1, p. 4]

Here, the Ring Cycle refers to Richard Wagner's Der Ring des Nibelungen, also known as "The Ring Cycle", "Wagner's Ring", or "The Ring". Great, now I got stuck on Wikipedia reading all about it and how J. R. R. Tolkien essentially drew from the same source material as Wagner--the Völsunga saga and the Poetic Edda--and even built upon some of Wagner's ideas. Learning sure is fun! I wanted to download a complete version of the Ring Cycle off of iTunes, but it appears that there is too many different versions, and I don't know which is best, plus it's very long, and thus kind of expensive.

Hotelier Science

"Madam, I am a machine but a very flexible one. My memories include all curricula of Procrustes Institute of Hotelier Science, including all case studies updated to midnight..." [1, p. 4]

A hotelier is an owner or CEO of a hotel, so one can imply that hotelier sciences would be the study of running and maintaining a hotel.

Porter

The voice answered thoughtfully, "Madam, I am a machine programmed for our food and beverage services. May I switch you to another program? Housekeeping? Head porter? Engineering?" [1, p. 3]

A porter is someone who is tasked with carrying burdens and/or performing custodial and/or maintenance work and/or other menial tasks. In other words, you can probably go straight from high school into a position as porter. Head porter would be the person in charge of all the other porters, I'm sure. Bellhop!

Tuesday, April 21, 2009

Harvest Brunch

A bodyless voice said, "Madam, may we offer you breakfast? We are proud of our Harvest Brunch: a lavish bowl of assorted fresh fruits; a tray of cheeses; a basket of freshly baked hot breads, crisp breads, and soft breads with jams and jellies and syrups and Belgian butter. Basted baby barlops en brochette; drawn eggs Octavian; smoked savannah slinker; farkels in sweetsour; Bavarian strudel; your choice of still and sparkling wines, skullbuster Strine beer, Mocha, Kona, Turkish, and Proxima coffees, blended or straight; all served with-- [1, p. 3]

This one is going to be a doozy. Google did not turn up anything definitive, but one can assume that a Harvest Brunch would be full of grains, as historically, the harvest season was a time when many crops would be harvested, and among those crops would be plenty of grains. Maybe not the most rigorous analysis, but the logic seems sound. Google also didn't turn up anything specific on categorizing breads by their temperature, crispiness, or softness. Perhaps a bread connoisseur would be able to shed more light on that subject. I did find a short article on the history of bread here. That site also contains a glossary of many of the world's known breads, so if you're really interested, I'd suggest at least skimming through it. I also found another short treatise on the history of bread and several types of bread at this site; you will notice that towards the bottom of that page, they mention a type of specialty bread known as Men's Bread. It's an organic blast of doughey healthiness. If you're interested in buying, you can look here.

So, the main difference between a jam and a jelly? The short answer is that jelly has been run through a filter to remove the pulp from the fruit it is made from, while jam has not. There is a third type of confection that fits along these lines known as fruit butter, which I had honestly never heard of until I read up on it. This brief response on Yahoo! Answers provides a pretty decent overview of the three types of confections. So, syrup? Syrup is basically sugar in water. The water is boiled away and the sugar is cooked to produce the amber or golden color that is typically associated with syrup. Maple syrup is, of course, made from maple tree sap. The sap from maple trees contains small amounts of sucrose and large amounts of water. Once most of the water is boiled away, the result is maple syrup.

The best that I could find in terms of Belgian butter is a type of gourmet butter known also as Chimay butter. So, where is Belgium, anyway? It is located directly north-east of France, with Chimay being a city near the border between France and Belgium. I did find some article on the web about butter from Belgium being banned in the U.S. and various other countries due to a high dioxin content, although I have no idea if this is referring to Chimay butter, or some other butter. Either way, it sounds good.

Basting is a style of cooking meat; it is cooked either in its own juices, or a prepared marinade, and the juice is occasionally reapplied over the with. According to the Heinlein concordance, baby barlops are an unidentified food item--it is quite possible that Heinlein simply made the name up.

I was not able to determine what drawn eggs are, but in my quest, I did discover--although not much to my surprise--that there is quite an array of different ways to prepare eggs. Wikipedia, being our ubiquitous buddy, has a list egg dishes that is quite enlightening to peruse through. Perhaps Heinlein was simply adept at inventing his own savory-sounding food items.

Smoked savannah slinker is listed in the Heinlein Concordance as being yet another unidentified food item, while farkels in sweetsour just plain doesn't turn up anything useful in Google.

Finally, something that actually exists. My search for Bavarian strudel turned up an item called Bavarian apple strudel, which, as you can imagine, is a pop tart-ey type pastry dish with apple in it.

The difference between still and sparkling wines is, of course, that sparkling wines have been carbonated.

Apparently Strine is a syncope of a joke for the way Australians pronounce "Australian", in a broad Australian accent. So "Strine" beer is just Australian beer.

Mocha coffee comes from mocha beans, Kona coffee comes from Kona coffee beans, which are grown exclusively in the mountains of Hawai'i, and is a highly coveted and highly expensive coffee, at least according to Wikipedia. Turkish coffee is made by boiling finely powdered roast coffee beans. I think Heinlein made up Proxima coffee; it likely refers somehow to the star Proxima Centari.

Frisson

Still clutching Pixel I went around and bent over the other side of the bed. (Gulp.) No one I knew. No one I would choose to bed with, even were he in perfect health. Which he was not; that side of the bed was soggy with blood. (Two gulps and a frisson.) [1, p. 2]

Damn Heinlein and his vast vocabulary! A frisson is a sudden shudder of excitement. You can probably think of it as a tingling going down your back as you get chills, either through fear or amazement, or some other emotion or mix thereof.

Prudent

I am not jumpy about skin but it did seem prudent to dress before reporting a corpse. [1, p. 2]

Prudent means to make a wise decision. Also not a word I learned from this book, but I did learn it from another Heinlein book. Unfortunately, Maureen did wake up next to the man while fully disrobed. I like how Heinlein omitted the comma between the two independent clauses in this sentence to give it a fast-paced yet whimsical feel. Heinlein knew his grammar, which is why he is so easily forgiven when he breaks one of its rules. The man knew what he was doing.

Thalamic

I forced a thalamic pause of at least a microsecond, maybe longer, and decided not to flee headlong outdoors, or out into the hallway, as the case might be . . . but to slow down and attempt to assess the situation, before screaming for help. [1, p. 2]

Poor Maureen has just woken up next to a dead man. The thalamus is a portion of the brain that is involved in sensory perception--touch, taste, smell, hearing, and seeing--so a "thalamic pause" would be a moment where one takes in their surroundings and pays attention to all their senses. I think anyone would want to take a thalamic pause of they woke up next to a dead person.

Starboard

My last clear memory was of being a passenger in a Burroughs irrelevant bus, bound for New Liverpool, when there was a loud bang, my head hit the seat in front of me, then a lady handed me a baby and we started filing out the starboard emergency exit, me with a cat in one arm and a baby in the other, and I saw a man with his right arm off-- [1, p. 1]

I didn't originally learn starboard from this book, but I did originally learn it from another Heinlein book, so I shall list it here. Starboard means "right side", particularly the right side of a vessel. An interesting article on its etymology, and its natural antonym, port side, can be found here.

Monday, April 20, 2009

To Sail Beyond the Sunset

The Life and Loves of Maureen Johnson (Being the Memoirs of a Somewhat Irregular Lady)
Mass Market Paperback
448 pages
Published by Ace (June 1, 1988)
ISBN-10: 0441748600
ISBN-13: 978-0441815470