2024年11月8日星期五

edifice, subterfuge, surreptitious, plum, plum cake. plumb, plumber, an affable dilettante with a plum in his mouth

Contractors Vie for Plum Work, Hacking for the United States

This edifice is unmistakably Christian, [but] this chapel is meant to belong to all of us

Hacker-turned-entrepreneur-turned-politician, Taiwan's Digital Minister Audrey Tang is skeptical about China's 5G strategy. Like the story about Greek subterfuge to conquer the city of Troy, Tang thinks the Chinese have a tech Trojan Horse of their own.

Donald Trump, Meet Your Precursor

By MANISHA SINHA

Andrew Johnson pioneered the recalcitrant racism and impeachment-worthy subterfuge the president is fond of.

Surreptitiously mining cryptocurrency on other people’s hardware is overtaking ransomware as a tool of choice for extorting money online.

By CHRISTOPHER DREW and JOHN MARKOFF
The government’s push into cyberwarfare has set off a rush among big military companies to secure billions of dollars in contracts and attract top young talent.

on Page 137:
"other hand, it insists that the "methodology of causation" can neither capture the social and personal richness of lives in a culture nor begin to plumb their historical ... "

Requiem

By JOHN UPDIKE

Published: January 28, 2009

Thomas Libetti

John Updike, a Lyrical Writer of the Middle-Class Man, Dies at 76 (January 28, 2009)

Times Topics: John Updike

It came to me the other day:
Were I to die, no one would say,
“Oh, what a shame! So young, so full
Of promise — depths unplumbable!”
Instead, a shrug and tearless eyes
Will greet my overdue demise;
The wide response will be, I know,
“I thought he died a while ago.”
For life’s a shabby subterfuge,
And death is real, and dark, and huge.
The shock of it will register
Nowhere but where it will occur.
— JOHN UPDIKE

Say it plain: that many have died for this day.

Sing the names of the dead who brought us here,

who laid the train tracks, raised the bridges,

picked the cotton and the lettuce, built

brick by brick the glittering edifices

they would then keep clean and work inside of.

Dr. Gawande is also in the fix-it business. He too began his writing career debunking the idea of magic in medicine. “The whole edifice of medical training is based on subterfuge,” he wrote in the online magazine Slate while a second-year surgical resident 10 years ago, going on to deconstruct the surreptitious manipulations that conspire to camouflage medicine’s inexperienced trainees.

Surreptitiously, Mimura made soles of two slightly different thicknesses, to compensate for the fact that Takahashi’s left leg was eight millimeters — about a third of an inch — longer than her right leg. She had tried a pair of the uneven soles before the Sydney Olympics, but felt uncomfortable.

sub・ter・fuge

subterfuge
noun [C or U] ━━ n. 口実, ごまかし.

a trick or a dishonest way of achieving something:

It was clear that they must have obtained the information by subterfuge.

口實、口実（こうじつ）

surreptitious

adjective

done secretly, without anyone seeing or knowing:

She seemed to be listening to what I was saying, but I couldn't help noticing her surreptitious glances at the clock.

surreptitiously

adverb

Joe surreptitiously had a look in the answer book.

surreptitiousness

noun [U]

edifice

noun [C]

1 FORMAL a large building, especially a splendid one:

The town hall is the only edifice surviving from the fifteenth century.

2 a system which has been established for a long time:

It looks as if the whole political edifice of the country is about to collapse.

（大きな）建物（building）；（寺院・宮殿などの壮大な）大建造物，殿堂
2体系，組織

edification, Christian ： (1) 基督奧體；教會之建立（弗四 12 *）。 (2) 教化；啟迪；立好榜樣。

*12為成全聖徒，使之各盡其職；為建樹基督的身體，

厄弗所書/Ephesians 4-12

“For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ:”

King James Version (KJV)

12 to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up 13 until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.

音節ed • i • fi • ca • tion
発音èdəfikéiʃən

[名]((形式))

1（道徳的・宗教的な）啓発，教化，徳育
2（精神的・道徳的）向上［高揚］

chapel ：小聖堂；小教堂；小禮拜堂；分堂： (1) 指學校、軍營、醫院等附設的教堂。 (2) 指大教堂內區隔的小教堂。

plum

n Definition: reward, prize
Antonyms: penalty, punishment
plum

See definition in Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary

Line breaks: plum

Pronunciation: /plʌm/ Definition of plum in English:

noun

1An oval fleshy fruit which is purple, reddish, or yellow when ripe and contains a flattish pointed stone.

1.1[USUALLY WITH MODIFIER] West Indian A small edible fruit from any of a number of trees.

EXAMPLE SENTENCES

2(also plum tree)The deciduous tree which bears plums.

Several species in the genus Prunus, family Rosaceae, in particular P. domestica

3[MASS NOUN] A reddish-purple colour:a pure silk shirt in shades of cream and soft plum[COUNT NOUN]: rosy pinks, rich coppers, and deep plums are the big fashion news[AS MODIFIER]: a plum blazer

4[USUALLY AS MODIFIER] informal A thing, typically a job, considered to be highly desirable:he landed a plum assistant producer’s job

adverb

chiefly USBack to top

variant spelling of plumb¹.the helicopter crashed plum on the cabins

Phrases

1: British Have an accent thought typical of the English upper classes:an affable dilettante with a plum in his mouth
like a ripe plum (or ripe plums) 2: Used to convey that something can be obtained with little or no effort:the country is likely to fall into the enemy’s hands like a ripe plum

MORE EXAMPLE SENTENCES

Origin

Old English plūme, from medieval Latin pruna, from Latin prunum (see prune¹).

Latin prunum is the source of both plum and prune (Late Middle English), a plum preserved by drying. The change from pr- to pl- is not an unusual one. The ‘l’ and ‘r’ are made in very similar parts of the mouth, and some languages do not distinguish between the two sounds.Plum pudding (mid 17th century) was originally made with plums. The use of plum to refer to something highly desirable, ‘the pick of the bunch’, probably arose from the idea of picking the tastiest bits out of a plum pudding. Upper-class people are sometimes said to have a plum in the mouth, or to speak with a plummy voice. The idea of having a plum in the mouth goes right back to the 1530s, though at first it meant that the speech was indistinct rather than posh.

plum cake 梅子蛋糕？

Pronunciation: /ˈplʌmkeɪk/

Definition of plum cake in English:

noun

A cake containing raisins, currants, and often orange peel and other candied fruits.

Perhaps originally containing prunes. 蛋糕含葡萄乾，(小粒無子)葡萄乾，常桔皮等果脯。也許最初含梅干。
Origin

Early 17th cent.; earliest use found in John Chamberlain (1553–1628), letter writer. From plum +cake.

plum (GOOD)

adjective [before noun] plummer, plummest
very good and worth having:
How did you manage to get such a plum job?另外一發音相同之PLUMB --下文的 plumb 錯誤應是 plum?With this view, they contracted with the water-works to lay on an unlimited supply of water, and with a corn-factory (grain processor) to supply periodically small quantities of oatmeal, and issued three meals of thin gruel a day...."* Who can forget the image of young Oliver Twist asking, "Please sir, may I have some more?"

This is not to say that all porridges were reserved for the indigent. Oats were a kitchen staple at the time for every household and many richer versions found their way on the tables of the wealthy as well as the working class.These dishes included plumb porridge or barley gruel, made from barley and water, with dried fruit added.

PLUMB was found in the Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary at the entries listed below.

第一次注意到我們的「水電工」（這詞有意思，因為兼做兩專業 ……），大陸是這樣稱呼的。這字眼應該在百年前就有（所以日文為「鉛管工.」），不知道為什麼到現還在各說各話。一種可能是：以前的建築對這些問題不管 …….

「我为何当上水暖工 ?

IT 经理出身的女水暖工珍妮特：不管经济状况如何，谁家的马桶坏了，水管漏水，都得修好它。英国的水暖工短缺，靠此谋生不错。」

學些單字

plumb (WATER) verb [T]
to supply a building or a device with water pipes, or to connect a building or a device to a water pipe:
We've discovered that our house isn't plumbed properly.
I think we can plumb the new bath into the existing pipes.
Have you plumbed the dishwasher in yet?
plumber noun [C]
a person whose job is to supply and connect, or repair water pipes, baths, toilets, etc:
When is the plumber coming to mend the burst pipe?
plumbing noun [U]
1 the water pipes and similar systems in a building:
There's something wrong with the plumbing.
2 the work of connecting water and other pipes in a building:
We did all the plumbing (work ) in our house ourselves.

----

plumb

━━ n. おもり; 下げ振り; 測鉛; 垂直.off [out of] plumb 　垂直で［正しく］ない. not straight vertically:
The external wall is out of plumb by half a metre.
━━ a., ad. 垂直の［に］; 〔話〕全く（の）; 正確に; 鉛管を敷設する, 配管工事を施す.
━━ v. plumberとして働く; 垂直度を調べる; 垂直にする ((up)); （水深を）測る; 見通す, 測り知る.

plumb (DEEP) verb [T]
1 SPECIALIZED to measure how deep something is, especially water
2 to understand or discover all about something:
Now that she had begun, she wanted to plumb her own childhood further.

plumb (EXACTLY) adverb INFORMAL
exactly:
The hotel is plumb in the middle of the town.
He hit me plumb on the nose.

plumb (COMPLETELY) adverb US INFORMAL
completely:
I plumb forgot your birthday.

plumb in 　（洗濯機などを）（排水管につないで）設置する.plumb the depths 　（絶望などの）極みを経験する ((of)). to reach the lowest point:
Roy plumbed the depths of despair when his wife left him.
HUMOROUS They must be really plumbing the depths (= must have been unable to find anyone better) if they're offering the job to her.

plumb

━━ n. おもり; 下げ振り; 測鉛; 垂直.

off [out of] plumb　垂直で［正しく］ない.
━━ a., ad. 垂直の［に］; 〔話〕全く（の）; 正確に; 鉛管を敷設する, 配管工事を施す.
━━ v. plumberとして働く; 垂直度を調べる; 垂直にする ((up)); （水深を）測る; 見通す, 測り知る.

plumb in　（洗濯機などを）（排水管につないで）設置する.

plumb the depths　（絶望などの）極みを経験する ((of)).