A Day of Truly Miniscule Personal Triumphs

[tesla]

I'm done with Tax! Well, the analysis anyway. (It's a work thing. Don't worry, I'm not planning to defraud the government. I did recently convince the IRS to give me back a wad of money that they owed me, which I'm told is no small feat, but it was wholly legitimate.)

When I got home my poor darling kittens were so hot that they began panting. I lugged the air conditioner down from the attic and got my bedroom set up as kitten haven. We are all comfortable on the bed now. I'm going to leave it this way tomorrow; I suppose they won't be crazy about the limited space, but it beats letting the poor beasties overheat. (They were actually hot to the touch when I got here. They had barely eaten for the past two days, but within 20 minutes of getting into the cool room they downed a whole bowl of food.)

Update - they're now running around like madkittens. They must be adequately cool.

The beasties have grown. Here are their photos as of Sunday:


Dylan


Shadow

When I got up this morning, I was hot, so I put my hair up in a ponytail. When I came home this evening, I was Really Damned Hot(TM), so I clipped the ponytail up off my neck. The result was a pleasingly, if accidentally, neo-Victorian updo:



Also, for the first time in literally twenty years, I don't have a single pimple on my face. (The one on my scalp doesn't count; it's above the hairline.) I don't expect this to last long, so shall celebrate it while I can. Acne is what causes me to grok the phrase "(to) plague one's life out."

Finally, a request: recommendations for English (the country, not just the language) books written between 1820 and 1890. Sometime in there the word "nice" went from meaning "excessively particular" to meaning roughly what it does today, and I'm interested in reading the nuances of the change, if such a thing can be done.

Thank you, and good night!

Comments

[guppiecat]

"The precise development of the very divergent senses which this word has acquired in English is not altogether clear. In many examples from the 16th and 17th centuries it is difficult to say in what particular sense the writer intended it to be taken."

To answer your question, forms 5 and 7.e of "nice" (meaning "Coy, shy, (affectedly) modest, reserved" and "refined, cultured" respectively) seem to be the closest to our modern usage. Referenced works include:

* 1592 - KVD Sol. & Pers.. I. ii "Then be not nice, Perseda as women woont To hasty louers."
* 1603 - Daniel Def. Rhime. H a b ""Eloquence and gay wordes are . . but the garnish of a nice time, the Ornaments that doe but decke the house of a State"
* 1634 - Milton Comus. 139 "Ere . . The nice Morn on th' Indian steep from her cabin'd loop hole peep"
* 1792 - Burns Yon Wild Mossy Mountains. iv "Of nice education but sma' is her share."
* 1794 - Mrs. Radcliffe Myst. Udolpho i "As conversation awakened the nicer emotions of her mind, that threw such a captivating grace around her."
* 1818 - Shelley Julian 536 "As we could guess From his nice habits and his gentleness."

By the way, my new magnifying lamp makes it much easier to read the compact OED. :)