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Jan 20, 2023
This week’s theme
Shoes

This week’s words
suede-shoed
saboteur
well-heeled
sneakernet
boot-faced

boot-faced
Photo: Alizoni

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A.Word.A.Day
with Anu Garg

boot-faced

PRONUNCIATION:
(BOOT-fayst)

MEANING:
adjective: Having a stern, angry, or sad expression.

ETYMOLOGY:
From the expression “to have a seaboot face” (to have grim face), probably alluding to seaboots being worn on a ship in bad weather. Earliest documented use: 1925.

USAGE:
“Jacqueline Wilson says, ‘Every time you see a librarian in a soap opera it’s a boot-faced woman going ‘Shush!’ I’ve never come across a librarian like that.’”
Jan Dalley; Turning Over a New leaf; Financial Times (London, UK); Sep 30, 2006.

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:
All art is autobiographical; the pearl is the oyster's autobiography. -Federico Fellini, film director and writer (20 Jan 1920-1993)

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