Double, double, toil and trouble! Witches cackle as their cauldrons bubble. Spiders creep. Black cats howl. Ghosts and spirits are on the prowl. All sorts of nasty things go in the witches’ brew. But the most important ingredient of all just might be… you! Spooky! This classic scene of malevolent madams making a most mysterious mixture entered our cultural imagination thanks to William Shakespeare’s Macbeth. …
It was a dark and stormy night when the writer turned to Dictionary.com for synonyms and definitions to make their writing pop. At least, it would be a dark and stormy night if said writer was basing a story on one of the most cliché (a trite, stereotyped expression that has lost all originality from being long overused) introductions to grace the page. If you’ve …
When you think of something (or someone) sinister, there’s a good chance it’s not a pleasant picture. Sinister is an adjective that means “threatening or portending evil, harm, or trouble.” That shadowy, sinister figure lurking in the dark alley, for example. But the word sinister, which comes from Latin, originally meant “left” or “on the left hand or side.” Even back in Latin, though, sinister …
Slowly but surely, travel is opening back up, and a lot of us are antsy to get on the road or hop on a plane. Before we do, though, we can take a minute to consider the names of all of the places we might want to visit and—a crucial question, for us at least—whether or not we even know how to pronounce them. After …