fettle

fettle \FET-l\, noun:

A state or condition of fitness or order; state of mind; spirits -- often used in the phrase "in fine fettle."

Aside from the problems with her voice . . . Miss Garland was in fine fettle last night.
-- Vincent Canby, "Judy Garland Sets the Palace Alight", New York Times, August 1, 1967

Back in 1987, the Conservatives won a thumping majority in a June general election, primarily because the economy was seen by grateful voters to be in fine fettle.
-- Larry Elliott, "Danger of a recurring nightmare", The Guardian, June 18, 2001

Many of the nuns were in fine fettle, even into their 80s and 90s.
-- John McCrone, "Sisters of mercy", The Guardian, August 18, 2001

He seems in fine fettle when we meet, and happy to discuss the film that gave him his break.
-- Charlotte O'Sullivan, "Naked ambition", The Guardian, February 7, 1999

Fettle is from Middle English fetlen, "to set in order," originally "to gird up," from Old English fetel, "a girdle."

verbiage

verbiage \VUR-bee-ij\, noun:

1. An overabundance of words; wordiness.
2. Manner or style of expression; diction.

The sheer volume of verbiage he has expelled over eight years is enough to make John Updike look blocked.
-- Andrew Sullivan, "Sounds of Silence", New Republic, January 15, 2001

Points like these seem so self-evident as not to merit much repeating, but in the professional literature they appear all the time, slightly dressed up in academic verbiage.
-- Michael Barrett, "The Case for More School Days", The Atlantic, November 1990

She also indulged in flowery verbiage that her classmates called "H.D." for "heightened diction."
-- John Habich, "Mother Country", Minneapolis Star Tribune, April 25, 2001

Verbiage comes from French, ultimately from Latin verbum, "word."

panache

panache \puh-NASH; -NAHSH\, noun:

1. Dash or flamboyance in manner or style.
2. A plume or bunch of feathers, esp. such a bunch worn on the helmet; any military plume, or ornamental group of feathers.

Dessert included a marvelous bread pudding and a fair bananas Foster,the old-time New Orleans dish, which was prepared with great panache tableside, complete with a flambé moment.
-- Eric Asimov, "New Orleans, a City of Serious Eaters.", New York Times, July 4, 1999

It is... an inevitable hit, a galvanizing eruption of energy, panache and arrogantly sure-footed stage craft that comes at a time when theatrical dance is in the doldrums.
-- Terry Teachout and William Tynan, "Seamy and Steamy.", Time, January 25, 1999

Although Black didn't have many friends and was not among the school's leaders, he was likeable, had panache, and his contemptuous tirades were rarely taken at face value.
-- Richard Siklos, Shades of Black: Conrad Black and the World's Fastest Growing Press Empire

Panache is from the French, from Medieval French pennache, from Italian pinnacchio, feather, from Late Latin pinnaculum, diminutive of penna, feather. It is related to pen, a writing instrument, originally a feather or quill used for writing.

capitulate

capitulate \kuh-PICH-uh-layt\, intransitive verb:

To surrender under agreed conditions.

Just before peace talks on Kosovo are due to resume, the United States and its allies are sending contradictory signals to Belgrade, making it less likely that President Slobodan Milosevic of Yugoslavia will capitulate on American terms.
-- Steven Erlanger, "West's Bosnia Move May Hurt Kosovo Bid", New York Times, March 7, 1999

I am ashamed to think how easily we capitulate to badges and names.
-- Ralph Waldo Emerson, Self-Reliance

We say "capitulate" because the terms (of surrender) were drawn up in capitula, which is Latin for "chapters." Chapter itself is related to capitulate.

edify

edify \ED-uh-fy\, transitive verb:

To instruct and improve, especially in moral and religious knowledge; to teach.
--edifying, adjective

In their tour, the judges saw some of the more edifying spots on the Internet
-- "Second Federal Panel Declares C.D.A. [the Communications Decency Act] Unconstitutional", New York Times, July 30, 1996

They viewed what edifying sights the coastal towns offered, including a fascinating zoo.
-- Paul C. Nagel, John Quincy Adams

Just what depth of woods is required to edify, modify and/or enlighten a person in the way that we know a stay within an unguarded, ongoing, wild wood can?
-- Charles Siebert, "Found in the Woods", New York Times Magazine, June 6, 1999

Edify is from Old French edifier, from Latin ædifico, ædificare, to build.

melee

melee \MAY-lay; may-LAY\, noun:

1. A fight or hand-to-hand struggle in which the combatants are mingled in one confused mass.
2. A confused conflict or mingling.

In another incident, two staff members required stitches from a melee that ensued from their attempts to confiscate a razor blade found in the sock of a boy who had just arrived from another facility.
-- James Garbarino, Lost Boys

The accident sparked a general melee, people smashing things just for the satisfaction of watching glass fly.
-- Dorothy Allison, Cavedweller

I was relieved when, apparently unaware of this tradition, the Harasis bedouin unceremoniously dug in, the dread orbs disappearing in a melee of hungry hands.
-- Nicholas Clapp, The Road to Ubar

Melee is from the French mêlée, from the past participle of Old French mesler, "to mix," ultimately from Latin miscere, "to mix." It is related to medley, "a jumbled assortment; a mixture."

numismatics

numismatics \noo-miz-MAT-iks; -mis-; nyoo-\, noun:

the collection and study of money (and coins in particular).

If [the modern counterfeiter] is satisfied with a so-so product, perhaps hoping to pass it in a crowded fast-food restaurant or in a saloon's dim light, he can download images of genuine bills from the Internet, simply by getting access to the Web site of a numismatics club, then run off his own bills.
-- "Officials Wary of Wave of Computer Counterfeiters", New York Times, March 12, 1998

Numismatics...is, in the main, an auxiliary to the knowledge of the trade and mutual intercourse of the ancients.
-- J. Leitch

Numismatics ultimately derives from the Greek nomos, a custom or convention, which has the derivative nomisma, anything sanctioned by custom, especially the current State coin. It can also refer to the study and collection of medals.

scion

scion \SY-uhn\, noun:

1. A detached shoot or twig of a plant used for grafting.
2. Hence, a descendant; an heir.

Convinced he was the scion of Louis Alexandre Lebris de Kerouac, a noble Breton, he was off to do genealogical research in the Paris libraries and then to locate his ancestor's hometown in Brittany.
-- Ellis Amburn, Subterranean Kerouac

Sassoon, scion of a famously wealthy Jewish banking family, had never needed to earn his living.
-- Philip Hoare, Oscar Wilde's Last Stand

Gates is the scion of an old, affluent Seattle family; Jobs is the adopted son of a machinist in Northern California.
-- "Steve Jobs, Hesitant Co-Founder, Makes New Commitment to Apple", New York Times, August 7, 1997

Scion derives from Old French cion, of Germanic origin.

undulate

undulate \UN-juh-layt; UN-dyuh-\, intransitive:

To move in, or have, waves; to vibrate; to wave; as, undulating air.

The actors' hands quiver and the poles undulate in the wind.
-- Peter Marks, "'The Caucasian Chalk Circle': Brecht Can Be Fun.", New York Times, May 25, 1998

Rather than tuna, several hundred white-sided dolphins come into focus, undulating crisply through the sea surface below.
-- Carl Safina, Song for the Blue Ocean:Encounters Along the World's Coasts and Beneath the Seas

Most startling was the dancer's exposed, undulating abdomen, which she could adroitly activate while hardly moving her feet.
-- Emily Wortis Leider, Becoming Mae West

Undulate derives from Latin undulare, from undula, a little wave, from unda, a wave.

beneficence

beneficence \buh-NEFF-i-suhns\, noun:

1. The practice of doing good; active goodness, kindness, or charity.
2. A charitable gift or act.

Lord Jeffrey told Dickens that it [A Christmas Carol] had "prompted more positive acts of beneficence than can be traced to all the pulpits and confessionals in Christendom since Christmas 1842."
-- Roger Highfield, The Physics of Christmas

From my grandfather Verus I learned good morals and the government of my temper. From the reputation and remembrance of my father, modesty and a manly character. From my mother, piety and beneficence and abstinence.
-- Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

She had disseminated around her what seemed an involuntary aura of beneficence and goodwill.
-- John Bayley, Elegy for Iris

Beneficence is from Latin beneficentia, from beneficus, kind, generous, obliging, from bene, well (from bonus, good) + facere, to do. One who, or that which, is characterized by beneficence is beneficent.

proponent

proponent \pruh-POH-nuhnt\, noun:

One who argues in support of something; an advocate; a supporter.

A fervent proponent of the work ethic, Reuther at first resisted the demand for early retirement, as he had rejected shorter hours in the 1950s.
-- Stanley Aronowitz, From the Ashes of the Old

He was a forthright proponent of the Vietnam War, contemptuous of the anti-war movement.
-- Richard Siklos, Shades of Black

As the first practical proponent of "natural" education--where the innate desire to learn is nourished and curiosity is unfettered--Pestalozzi abandoned the tradition of interminable lectures followed by student recitation that characterized typical instruction for all age groups, in favor of more active, hands-on activities.
-- Norman Brosterman, Inventing Kindergarten

Now, at the dawn of the new millennium, proponents of string theory claim that the threads of this elusive unified tapestry finally have been revealed.
-- Brian Greene, The Elegant Universe

Proponent is from the present participle of Latin proponere, "to put forth," from pro-, "forth" + ponere, "to put."

misprize

misprize \mis-PRYZ\, transitive verb:

1. To hold in contempt.
2. To undervalue.

I hesitate to appear to misprize my native city, but how can the history of dear, sedate old London town possibly compare to Paris for sheer excitement?
-- Alistair Horne, Seven Ages of Paris

Or did he misprize such fidelity and harden his heart against so great a love as hers?
-- Ludovico Ariosto, Orlando Furioso, translated by Guido Waldman

Alternatively, when disagreements are noticed, they may by chance be overemphasized by those who misprize their significance by failing to assess the pressure exerted by economic and institutional factors as opposed to the purely intellectual.
-- Ellen Handler Spitz, "Warrant for trespass/ permission to peer", The Art Bulletin, December 1, 1995

Misprize comes from Middle French mesprisier, from mes-, "amiss, wrong" + prisier, "to appraise."

tintinnabulation

tintinnabulation \tin-tih-nab-yuh-LAY-shuhn\, noun:

A tinkling sound, as of a bell or bells.

One found oneself immersed in the infinitely nuanced tintinnabulations of clapping cymbal rhythms passed from one player to the next, in the barely audible, rain-like patter of drums that suddenly grew into an overwhelming mechanical onslaught.
-- Tim Page, "From Japan, The Thundering Drums of Kodo", Newsday, February 24, 1995

Tintinnabulation derives from Latin tintinnabulum "a bell," from tintinnare from tinnire, "to jingle."

vociferous

vociferous \voh-SIF-uhr-uhs\, adjective:

Making a loud outcry; clamorous; noisy.

Claudio has work to do and I have a vociferous son demanding a story.
-- Ariel Dorfman, Heading South, Looking North: A Bilingual Journey

The local heroes received meals, heard speeches, were presented with flags, and were accompanied to railroad stations by vociferous crowds.
-- Jeffry D. Wert, A Brotherhood of Valor

Vociferous derives from Latin vociferari, "to shout, to cry out" from vox, "voice" + ferre, "to carry."

disconcert

disconcert \dis-kuhn-SURT\, transitive verb:

1. To disturb the composure of.
2. To throw into disorder or confusion; as, "the emperor disconcerted the plans of his enemy."

In steering a small boat before a heavy gale, don't look back -- it may disconcert you.
-- Frank Arthur Worsley, Shackleton's Boat Journey

I wander away, disconcerted by this sudden sense of having been cut short, frozen in mid-flow.
-- Paul Golding, The Abomination

They were disconcerted each time they saw him change from one evening to the next from a dramatic role to a comic one, from the part of a good man to that of the villain, as if he were thereby revealing some incomprehensible mutability in his being; but every time, after just a few lines, they would become wholly engrossed in the new fiction, convincing themselves that this was just how he was.
-- Paola Capriolo, The Woman Watching

Disconcert is derived from Old French desconcerter, from des-, "dis-" + concerter, from Old Italian concertare, "to act together, to agree."

suffuse

suffuse \suh-FYOOZ\, transitive verb:

To spread through or over in the manner of fluid or light; to flush.

She gave me a long slow look, as if she were deciding something, and then she allowed herself to blush, the color suffusing her throat in a delicious mottle of pink and white.
-- T. Coraghessan Boyle, T. C. Boyle Stories

Have you ever felt happiness suffuse all the cells in your body and a smile light up your face?
-- Sarabjit Singh, "Queen of the Hills", India Currents, November 30, 1996

Like an angel or an earthquake, it isn't there and then it is; it doesn't steal over us and suffuse us with a festive spirit like the gradual effects of alcohol or good deeds.
-- Barbara Peters Smith, "Gladness descends on her home", Sarasota Herald Tribune, December 27, 2003

Suffuse comes from the past participle of Latin suffundere, "to overspread; to suffuse," from sub-, "under" + fundere, "to pour."

kitsch

kitsch \KICH\, noun:

1. Art characterized by pretentious bad taste.
2. Relating to, or characterized by, kitsch.

A fanatical collector of 1950s atomic kitsch and a talent scoutfor what might best be called "outsider art" and artists, Ms. Willis foundher online home.
-- Denise Caruso, "Success Stories From Ebay", New York Times, May 24, 1999

The tone isn't always matched, unfortunately, by that of the performances, which can veer toward kitsch and cuteness.
-- Ben Brantley, "Cymbeline': Masterful Fairy Tale of Troubled Romance", New York Times, June 5, 1999

One of his victims has her walls covered with erotic kitsch; awriter and his wife decorate their home as if it were a rejected stage set from "2001."
-- Edward Rothstein, "Kubrick and Beethoven, a Marriage Made in Hell", New York Times, March 15, 1999

Kitsch comes from German.

auspicious

auspicious \aw-SPISH-uhs\, adjective:

1. Giving promise of success, prosperity, or happiness; predicting good; as, "an auspicious beginning."
2. Prosperous; fortunate; as, "auspicious years."

But as Saturday fell on a very auspicious day in the Chinese calendar, every hotel in Nanjing was booked for weddings.
-- Seth Kaplan with Craig S. Smith, "Adventure the Chinese Way", New York Times, May 3, 2000

The hard truth of fire management is that the conditions most auspicious for a "prescribed burn," in which dangerously dense pine forests are purged of combustible debris, are not so very different from those that can lead to a devastating wildfire.
-- George Johnson, "Planned Blaze Close Cousin of a Wildfire", New York Times, May 12, 2000

The priest studied the birth stars of husband and wife, and chose the most auspicious date for a groundbreaking ceremony, a chilly day in April.
-- Alastair Gordon, "Raj Style Takes the Silk Road to the Suburbs", New York Times, January 27, 2000

Auspicious derives from Latin auspicium, "an omen, a sign," from auspex, "one who observes or looks at the habits of birds for purposes of divination," from avis, "bird" + specere, "to look, to look at."

hoary

hoary \HOR-ee\, adjective:

1. White or gray with age; as, "hoary hairs."
2. Ancient; extremely old; remote in time past.

Once upon a time, memoirs were written by hoary chaps casting rheumy glances back towards their golden youth: no more.
-- Erica Wagner, "Post-Post-Modern memoir", Times (London), July 19, 2000

Had Mozart lived to the hoary old age of 73, he might indeed have fallen out of favor in an era besotted with Rossini, becoming a "largely forgotten, neglected, unperformed composer."
-- Marilyn Stasio, "Crime", New York Times, June 23, 1996

Mr. Weicker spends most of his time serving up hoary war stories and settling old political scores.
-- Jeff Greenfield, "Politically Imprudent", New York Times, June 18, 1995

Compare that with the elements of a musical in about 1920: the star in a cliche story that was merely a framing device for generic musical numbers, hoary joke-book gags, and the usual specialty performers in a staging more often than not by a hack.
-- Ethan Mordden, Coming Up Roses

Hoary derives from Middle English hor, from Old English har, "gray; old (and gray-haired)."

evanescent

evanescent \ev-uh-NES-unt\, adjective:

Liable to vanish or pass away like vapor; fleeting.

The Pen which gives. . . permanence to the evanescent thought of a moment.
-- Horace Smith, Tin Trumpet

Every tornado is a little different, and they are all capricious, evanescent and hard to get a fix on.
-- "Oklahoma Tornado Offers Hints of How a Killer Storm Is Born", New York Times, May 11, 1999

The accidentally famous. . . may write books, appear on talk shows, and, in so doing, attract even greater public attention. This type of celebrity status, of course, is brittle and evanescent.
-- Lawrence M. Friedman, The Horizontal Society

Evanescent is from Latin evanescere, "to vanish," from e-, "from, out of" + vanescere, "to disappear," from vanus, "empty."

torrid

torrid \TOR-uhd\, adjective:

1. Violenty hot; drying or scorching with heat; burning; parching; as, "torrid heat."
2. Characterized by intense emotion; as, "a torrid love affair."
3. Emotionally charged and vigorously energetic; as, "a torrid dance."

Cyrene's torrid soil
-- Milton

Taniperla is a tumbledown coffee-farming outpost in torrid lowlands in Chiapas state.
-- "Mexico Sees Both Carrot and Stick Fail in Chiapas", New York Times, May 17, 1998

There are other treasures in this humorous phantasmagoria of song--the torrid pavement dancing of Fred Davis and Eddie Sledge, the bland gunman fooling of Harry Clark and Jack Diamond, the antic dancing masquerade that serves as first scene to 'The Taming of the Shrew' sequence.
-- "At the Theatre: 'Kiss Me, Kate'", New York Times, December 31, 1948

Still, the idea of a torrid affair between the teen-ager from Oak Park, Ill[inois], and the shapely auburn-haired nurse, fits the myth of Hemingway as an icon of male prowess -- hunter, drinker, fighter, writer and lover.
-- "A Hemingway Story, and Just as Fictional", New York Times, January 26, 1997

Fleisher has been going at a torrid pace as well, but he acknowledged after his second straight 67 that if he hadn't birdied two of his last three holes, O'Connor likely would have had a walkover today.
-- "O'Connor Turns Up Heat for Final Day: Irishman Is Seeking First Seniors Win", Washington Post, July 4, 1999

Stocks rose for a third consecutive session yesterday, pushed higher by money flowing into stocks of the biggest and most widely traded companies and torrid demand for companies that do business on the Internet.
-- "Stocks Rise Again, Buoyed by Technology and Internet Shares", New York Times, December 22, 1998

Torrid derives from Latin torridus, parched, burnt, dry, from torreo, torrere, to burn, parch, dry up with heat or thirst. The noun form of the word is torridness or torridity.

regale

regale \rih-GAY(uh)L\, transitive verb:

1. To entertain with something that delights.
2. To entertain sumptuously with fine food and drink.
3. To feast.
4. A sumptuous feast.
5. A choice food; a delicacy.
6. Refreshment.

If I've been away, and the boys do remember to ask about my trip, I remark on their thoughtfulness by saying, 'Thanks for asking!' and then regale them with stories about my journey.
-- Lucy Calkins, Raising Lifelong Learners: A Parent's Guide

He might also regale them with tales of how his Magic team beat Jordan's Bulls, 108-102, in Game 6 to win their four-of-seven-game Eastern Conference semifinal series before a stunned crowd of 24,332 tonight at the United Center.
-- "Bulls Burst in the Air as Magic Moves On", New York Times, May 19, 1995

Levin settled his guests in the dense, cool shade of the young aspens on a bench and some stumps purposely put there for visitors to the bee-house who might be afraid of the bees, and he went off himself to the hut to get bread, cucumbers, and fresh honey, to regale them with.
-- Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karenina, translated by Constance Garnett

Regale comes from French régaler, "to entertain." It is related to gallant.

cosmopolite

cosmopolite \koz-MOP-uh-lyt\, noun:

1. One who is at home in every place; a citizen of the world; a cosmopolitan person.
2. (Ecology) An organism found in most parts of the world.

At first, Audubon made comparatively little impression in America, but he was an immediate success in Britain, where he presented himself alternately as a rustic backwoodsman and a sophisticated cosmopolite.
-- Alan Fern, "A Great Original's Great Originals", New York Times, December 12, 1993

He was a big-city sophisticate and moved easily in international film circles but, like his exact contemporary, the Japanese novelist Yukio Mishima (also a globetrotting cosmopolite), Pasolini rejected the glossy consumer culture that had made him famous in favor of the standards of an earlier, more rigid and more traditional society.
-- Edmund White, "Movies and Poems", New York Times, June 27, 1982

Behind the professional caution is a figure of storied warmth and charm, an American-educated cosmopolite as comfortable in the Midwest as in the Middle East.
-- Paula Span, "Man of Many Worlds", Washington Post, February 28, 1998

Cosmopolite comes from Greek kosmopolites, from kosmos, "world" + polites, "citizen," from polis, "city."

plaintive

plaintive \PLAYN-tiv\, adjective:

Expressive of sorrow or melancholy; mournful; sad.

Meanwhile Jack Byron's plight in France was becoming desperate and his letters to his sister increasingly plaintive.
-- Phyllis Grosskurth, Byron: The Flawed Angel

The shadows have lengthened, and the night birds have begun their plaintive chorus.
-- Valerie Martin, "Being St. Francis", The Atlantic, August 2000

. . .the plaintive cries of loneliness of the immigrant.
-- Jeremy Eichler, "Tango and the Individual Talent", New Republic, July 3, 2000

Plaintive derives from Old French plainte, "complaint," from Latin planctus, past participle of plangere, "to strike (one's breast), to lament."

laudable

laudable \LAW-duh-bul\, adjective:

Worthy of praise; commendable.

Her first answer was laudable -- she wrote that yes, she would remain engaged to a man who fell seriously ill subsequent to the engagement.
-- Enid Nemy, "Metropolitan Diary", New York Times, January 11, 1999

The second sense in which we are feminist researchers comes from our belief that equity between boys and girls, men and women, is a laudable goal.
-- Justine Cassell and Henry Jenkins (editors), From Barbie to Mortal Kombat: Gender and Computer Games

Laudable comes from Latin laudabilis, from laudare, "to praise," from laus, laud-, "praise."

bevy

bevy \BEV-ee\, noun:

1. A group; an assembly or collection.
2. A flock of birds, especially quails or larks; also, a herd of roes.

In an instant, a bevy of perfumed and coiffed poodles would begin a raucous race from her bedroom to the bottom of the stairs.
-- James A. Drake, Rosa Ponselle: A Centenary Biography

Shortt is a more attractive man, and was followed about by bevies of adoring damsels.
-- Selected Letters of Rebecca West, edited by Bonnie Kime Scott

Bevy comes from Middle English bevey. It perhaps originally signified a drinking company, possibly deriving from Old French beivre, "to drink," from Latin bibere.

immolate

immolate \IM-uh-layt\, transitive verb:

1. To sacrifice; to offer in sacrifice; to kill as a sacrificial victim.
2. To kill or destroy, often by fire.

What have I gained, that I no longer immolate a bull to Jove, or to Neptune, or a mouse to Hecate . . . if I quake at opinion, the public opinion, as we call it; or at the threat of assault, or contumely, or bad neighbors, or poverty, or mutilation, or at the rumor of revolution, or of murder?
-- Ralph Waldo Emerson, Essays and English traits

In the city of Bhopal, police used water canon to thwart a group of Congress workers who were on the point of immolating themselves.
-- Peter Popham, "Gandhi critics are expelled by party", Independent, May 21, 1999

Bowls of honey at the room's center drew random insects to immolate themselves against a nearby bug zapper.
-- Carol Kino, "Damien Hirst at Gagosian", Art in America, May 2001

Immolate comes from the past participle of Latin immolare, "to sacrifice; originally, to sprinkle a victim with sacrificial meal," from in- + mola, "grits or grains of spelt coarsely ground and mixed with salt."

glower

glower \GLAU-uhr\, intransitive verb:

1. To look or stare angrily or with a scowl.
2. An angry or scowling look or stare.

At one point, the head of the institute started chatting with colleagues sitting at a table behind Yeltsin, prompting the Russian President to interrupt his reading and glower at them.
-- Bruce W. Nelan, "The Last Hurrah?", Time, April 26, 1993

A baby wearing a disposable nappy has been placed on a tree trunk in dark woodland: he seems to glower at us disapprovingly, like a troll, or a mini-Churchill.
-- Margaret Walters, "The secret life of babies", New Statesman, September 13, 1996

A boyish-looking man who frowned and glowered, trying to look more authoritative than his twenty-nine years, Andrei said his job was to focus on the convolutions in Russian property law.
-- Eleanor Randolph, Waking the Tempest

Floyd approached me with a glower, cheeks reddened, indignant.
-- William Peter Blatty, Demons Five, Exorcists Nothing

Glower is from Middle English gloren, perhaps ultimately of Scandinavian origin.

admonition

admonition \ad-muh-NISH-uhn\, noun:

1. Gentle or friendly reproof.
2. Counseling against a fault or oversight; friendly caution or warning.

After debating whether Keayne should be excommunicated, the congregation concluded that an admonition would suffice.
-- Patricia O'Toole, Money & Morals in America

And in religious families, the biblical admonition, "Let he who is without sin cast the first stone," is part of living-room and kitchen table conversations.
-- Ann O'Hanlon, "Strange lessons for inquiring children", Irish Times, September 14, 1998

Or there is this simple admonition: "Be careful, God is watching."
-- Roger Cohen, "A Land Where God Is Working Overtime", New York Times, August 23, 1998

Admonition derives from Latin admonitio, admonition-, from admonitus, past participle of admonere, to remind, or warn, strongly, from ad- (here used intensively) + monere, to remind, to warn.

comestible

comestible \kuh-MES-tuh-buhl\, adjective:

1. Suitable to be eaten; edible.
2. Something suitable to be eaten; food.

I came to Adria's lab expecting subtle combinations and rare ingredients, the real outer limit of the comestible.
-- Adrian Searle, "Spray-on sauces, caviar for astronauts and aerosols of wine. . .", The Guardian, April 6, 2001

No matter how many flip-flops the nutrition gurus may make in deciding whether a particular comestible will kill or cure, most Americans seem to trust their instincts and eat what they please.
-- Richard Martin, "Dollars to doughnuts", Nation's Restaurant News, May 29, 2000

This rare comestible calls for specially designed platters, holders, and forks, but how well worth their acquisition!
-- Samuel Chamberlain, Clémentine in the Kitchen

Both men are descended from the fourth Earl of Sandwich, who is credited with inventing the namesake comestible in the mid-l8th century.
-- Amanda Mosle Friedman, "Noble heir to sandwich inventor starts namesake delivery outfit", Nation's Restaurant News, April 23, 2001

Comestible comes from Late Latin comestibilis, from comestus, from comesus, past participle of comedere, "to eat up, to consume," from com-, intensive prefix + edere, "to eat."