playtron n.— «Such devotion is common among “Rennies” or “playtrons,” as the most serious Renaissance-obsessed merrymakers call themselves. Many have attended the festival for decades—sometimes traveling great...
ghost fishing n.— «Ghost fishing When lost nets, loose traps or fragments of other broken equipment continue to catch and kill marine life. Modern traps have escape vents constructed from biodegradable materials to allow lobsters to...
sneak into town v. phr.— «Scarier than anything in “Captivity” was the drive to Danvers I had to go through to see it. The new horror film, a wan, derivative entry in the torture-porn cycle, didn’t screen for critics and is...
loot in the boot n.— «My shape is that of a slightly distorted heavy pear: slender, Chabella-like shoulders and a gently rising collarbone cast lines that soften and swell past a high waist to what Amy and I refer to as “loot in the...
Chicago way n.— «When asked how he could have pulled off such an escape, Mr. Alsammarae, who moved to Chicago in 1976 but returned to Iraq just after the invasion, laughed uproariously for 20 seconds. Then, recycling a famous line from an...
goodbye effect n.— «The beam produces what experimenters call the “Goodbye effect,” or “prompt and highly motivated escape behavior.” In human tests, most subjects reached their pain threshold within 3 seconds, and...