Merriam-Webster's Word Of The Day Namedrops Tom Skilling

By Tankboy in Arts & Entertainment on Jan 17, 2012 5:40PM

We're word-nerds so it should come as no surprise that the Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day podcast is a daily listen for us. We appreciate that its writers uncover the meanings behind the meanings and especially enjoy seeing where they will pull usage examples, since they seem to be on the lookout for recent writings to underscore language as a living thing.

Today's word is "graupel," a climate-related word whose usage example was from a column by Tom Skilling in the October 28, 2011, edition of The Chicago Tribune! His quoted example of the word in use was:

In counties adjacent to the Illinois-Wisconsin border, graupel (snow enveloped by super-cooled water droplets) or small hail was reported in Kenosha, Racine, Lake Geneva, Wauconda, and Huntley.

. Listen to the whole January 17, 2012 podcast to delve more deeply into "graupel" and enjoy Skilling's sentence as read in the dulcet tones of podcast host. (Ed Note: Coincidentally, "graupel" was our weather word only five days ago. — CS)