Daily Content Archive
(as of Monday, November 19, 2018)| Word of the Day | |||
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| Daily Grammar Lesson | |
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Reporting the NegativeWhen we tell other people what someone else told us, it is called "indirect speech" or "reported speech." When we are reporting negative information, how do we know where to put the negating "not" or "never"? More... | |
| Article of the Day | |
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 Coronal LoopsVisible around the darkened Sun during a total solar eclipse, the corona is the luminous envelope surrounding the Sun outside the chromosphere—the upper, rarefied solar atmosphere. The basic structure of the corona is formed by coronal loops, which result from the twisted solar magnetic flux within the Sun and exhibit a wide range of temperatures. How are these massive coronal loops related to the coronal heating problem—the mystery of why the Sun's corona is far hotter than its surface? More... | |
| This Day in History | |
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 Apollo 12 Lands on the Moon (1969)In 1969, four months after the Apollo 11 mission culminated with the first moonwalk, Apollo 12 returned to the Moon with astronauts Pete Conrad, Alan Bean, and Richard Gordon. The craft touched down on the Ocean of Storms near the Surveyor 3 probe, which had landed there in 1967, and Conrad and Bean walked to the probe to remove some of its instruments to take back to Earth for study. What were Conrad's first words when he set foot on the lunar surface? More... | |
| Today's Birthday | |
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 Mikhail Vasilyevich Lomonosov (1711)With an extraordinarily broad education, Lomonosov became a prominent figure of 18th-century Russia in many capacities. He was a poet, a language reformer, a chemistry professor, and founder of Moscow State University. He created the first colored-glass mosaics in Russia. He designed a telescope and hypothesized the presence of an atmosphere on Venus. He cataloged more than 3,000 minerals and explained the origin of icebergs. His experiments in physics contradicted what commonly accepted theory? More... | |
| Quotation of the Day | |
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 Lord I disbelieve -- help thou my unbelief.E. M. Forster (1879-1970) | |
| Idiom of the Day | |
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ride the pine— In sports (especially baseball), to remain sitting on the bench, rather than be an active participant in the game. Primarily heard in US. More... | |
| Today's Holiday | |
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 Garifuna Settlement Day (2018)Garifuna Settlement Day honors the heritage of the Garifuna people, a unique ethnic group in the Caribbean and Central America. In 1943, Garafuna Settlement Day was declared a holiday in the southern districts of Belize, and it is now celebrated throughout the country. There are long sessions of traditional drumming and dancing, and Garifuna crafts and food are sold and displayed. Events to raise awareness and appreciation of Garifuna culture are common, including special days to dress in traditional clothing, a Miss Garifuna Belize beauty pageant, parades, and rallies. More... | |
| Word Trivia | |
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Today's topic: mineraldiamond - Developed from adamant—the name of the hardest stone or mineral of ancient times—from Latin adamans, from Greek adamas, "invincible" (a-, "not," and daman, "to tame"). More... Formica - Got its name from being created as a substitute "for mica," a mineral. More... mineral - Etymologically "something obtained by mining," from Latin minera, "ore." More... snow - Technically a mineral, it is Teutonic in origin, from an Indo-European root shared by the Latin words niv-/nix and Greek nipha; the spelling snow first appeared in English around 1200. More... | |