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A.Word.A.Day--Achilles' heel

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Achilles' heel (uh-KIL-eez heel) noun

A seemingly small but actually mortal weakness.

[From Achilles' being vulnerable only in the heel.]

"Not that I think the whole Y2K thing was merely hype. From what I read and heard, it was the sounding of alarm by some people who saw this particular Achilles' heel in the technostructure that caused business and government executives around the world to take the precautionary measures that spared us real grief." Dudley Barlow, A light in the outhouse, Education Digest, Mar 1, 2000

This week's theme: words and phrases from classical mythology.

X-Bonus

How far you go in life depends on your being tender with the young, compassionate with the aged, sympathetic with the striving and tolerant of the weak and strong. Because someday in life you will have been all of these. -George Washington Carver (1864?-1943)

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