I have the [W:OED] Word Of The Day pop up in my RSS thingy. Yesterday’s word was, predictably, [W:Shrovetide] – c1425 Orolog. Sapient. vii. in Anglia X. 386/39 {Th}e sondaye In Quinquagesime, with {th}e tweyne dayes folowynge, {th}at is clepyd Schroftyde.
Todays, by contrast, is [W:Drum and bass] which dates back as far as – 1990 [W:The Face (magazine)] Nov. 53/2 ‘Dub Be Good To Me’..is Beats International‘s most characteristic creation. It’s drum and bass culture, the sound of downtempo Britain after midnight. 1997 S. BARROW & P. DALTON Reggae v. 204/1 But the first vocal record with a full dub version on its flip..is usually recognised as the [W:Little Roy] ‘Hard Fighter’ track on the [W:Lloyd Daley] Syndicate label, recorded in March 1971, with the splendid ‘Voo-doo’ as its strictly drum and bass counterpart from [W:The Hippy Boys].
The OED Rocks! But, alas, no Little Roy or Hippy Boys on Spotify yet. 🙁
The best word of the day has to be ricockulous, which describes something a degree or two worse than ridiculous but not quite as bad as ripenisulous. It was used by [W:Ben Goldacre] writing about the Facebook causes cancer nonsense on his Bad Science blog. Splendid.