Vocabulary.com Challenge - 23/08/13 Tea Time Session

Pick the right choice:

1. Nato said that one American had died in fighting in the east while another ________ to wounds suffered in a roadside bombing in the south.
1. succumbed
2. clambered
3. hived
4. droned
2. Semantic web tools could make it easier for Prying eyes to get at personal information:
1. Climb awkwardly, as if by scrambling
2. To express great joy
3. Be larger in number, quantity, power, status or importance
4. Search or inquire in a meddlesome way.
3. Jaded means:
1. Wearied
2. Innovative
3. Refractory
4. Silky
4. Ameliorate means:
1. Intend
2. Estimate
3. Photograph
4. Improve
5. Belligerent means?
1. Glossy
2. unpeaceful
3. Contributing
4. Sleek
6. Apathy means?
1. A strong liking
2. An inclination to do something
3. Uneasiness about the fitness of an action
4. An absence of emotion or enthusiasm

Answers:

1. A, Succumb is a verb that means to be fatally overwhelmed. Use the verb succumb to say that someone yields to something they've tried to fight off, such as despair, temptation, disease or injury.

If you succumb to cancer, it means you die of it. From this sentence you can see that this verb is usually followed by the preposition to. The Latin root is succumbere, from the prefix sub- "under" plus -cumbere "to lie down."

2. D, To pry is to try and find something out that is none of your business. We all hate people who pry, sticking their nose into our personal affairs, and it is an annoying and disrespectful habit.

We are taught as children to ask questions, but sometimes those questions are used to pry, or peek into someone's private business. A nosy person will peek into some else's life the same way one might use a crowbar to pry open a crate (though — alert! — that pry has a different origin). Our word is thought to come from a word related to the Old English verb beprīwan, "to wink," which evolved into the Middle English prie, "to peer in," which gives us today's meaning.

3. A, If you've done something so much that it doesn't excite you anymore but just leaves you tired, consider yourself jaded. If someone says you look a little jaded, it just means that you look tired.

The history of jaded is not clear, but perhaps it is related to the noun jade, an old term for a worn-out horse. Even if not, picturing a tired old horse may be a nice way to remember that jaded means dulled or tired from too much of something. The word can also mean cynical because of bad experiences with something, like a jaded journalist who doesn't see the person behind the politician.

4. D, Ameliorate is a verb that means to make better.
5. B, Belligerent is an adjective that means engaged in war.
6. D, use the noun Apathy when someone is not interested in the important things that are happening. You might feel apathy for the political process after watching candidates bicker tediously with one another. Although ‘apathy’ is a lazy-sounding word that indicates, ‘lack of interest, action or emotion towards something’. Example, ‘Voter’s apathy’, ‘Student’s apathy’, ‘Consumer’s apathy’.