inanition

inanition \in-uh-NISH-uhn\, noun:

1. The condition or quality of being empty.
2. Exhaustion, as from lack of nourishment.
3. Lack of vitality or spirit.

The problem that faces British universities is not that they have become fat and lazy, but that they have been starved beyond lean efficiency into inanition.
-- John Sutherland, "A contest that no one can really win", The Guardian, August 14, 2000

Even without, or before, revolution or foreign invasion, states can decline of their own inanition.
-- Harold Perkin, "The rise and fall of empires: the role of surplus extraction", History Today, April 2002

Sadly, though not surprisingly, convention speeches designed to rouse voters from their indifference only exacerbate the country's inanition.
-- Thomas J. Mccarthy, "This year's national party meetings displayed poll-itics as usual", America, September 9, 2000

Inanition derives from Latin inanitio, "emptiness," from inanire, "to make empty," from inanis, "empty." It is related to inane, "lacking sense or intelligence; pointless."

tetchy

tetchy \TECH-ee\, adjective:

Peevish; testy; irritable.

Waugh's tetchy and combative personality made him a difficult companion at arms.
-- Penelope Lively, "A Maverick Historian", The Atlantic, February 2001

Wright was in Tokyo, busy with the Imperial Hotel, firing off telegrams blaming his son, Lloyd, and Schindler for nagging cost overruns that Barnsdall, always tetchy about parting with money, was balking at.
-- Greg Goldin, "Light Houses", Los Angeles Magazine, February 2001

His every word was pure gold then, and even the chairman, who is not known to hide his light under a bushel, got a little tetchy being asked to opine on every economic subject known to man.
-- Jamie Dettmer, "Greenspan Doesn't Always Get It Right", Insight on the News, February 26, 2001

As prams trundle and toddlers bawl, bargain-hunters try to shove, grab and kick their way to consumerist nirvana, while their spouses, weighed down by bulging bags, get seriously tetchy.
-- Kim Gilmour, "Hello, good buy", Internet Magazine, November 2001

Tetchy probably comes from Middle English tecche, "a bad habit," from Old French tache, teche, "a spot, stain, blemish, habit, vice."

ululate

ululate \UL-yuh-layt; YOOL-\, intransitive verb:

To howl, as a dog or a wolf; to wail; as, ululating jackals.

He had often dreamed of his grieving family visiting his grave, ululating as only the relatives of martyrs may.
-- Edward Shirley, Know Thine Enemy: A Spy's Journey into Revolutionary Iran

She wanted to be on the tarmac, to ululate and raise her hands to the heavens.
-- Deborah Sontag, "Palestinian Airport Opens to Jubilation", New York Times, November 25, 1998

She used harrowing, penetrating nasal tones and a rasp that approached Janis Joplin's double-stops; she made notes break and ululate.
-- Jon Pareles, "On the Third Day There Was Whooping and There Was Moshing", New York Times, August 18, 1998

Ululate derives from Latin ululare, to howl, to yell, ultimately of imitative origin. The noun form is ululation; the adjective form is ululant.

pedestrian

pedestrian \puh-DES-tree-uhn\, noun, adjective:

1. a person who gets about on foot; walker
2. going on foot; walking
3. without imagination; dull

You know, the fact that every morning you get a script in your mailbox, that's going to stop. All these little pedestrian, mundane things. And the cash.
-- Paul Reiser

by 1716, from Latin pedester/pedestris "plain, prosaic," from pedes "one who goes on foot," from pes/pedis "foot." Meaning "going on foot" is first attested 1742; the noun meaning "walker" is c 1770.

incisive

incisive \in-SAHY-siv\, adjective:

1. penetrating; cutting; biting; trenchant
2. remarkably clear and direct; sharp; keen; acute
3. adapted for cutting or piercing
4. of or pertaining to the incisors

It is difficult to produce a television documentary that is both incisive and probing when every twelve minutes one is interrupted by twelve dancing rabbits singing about toilet paper.
-- Rod Serling

by 1528, from Latinincisivus, from incis-/incidere "to cut into"

equine

equine \EE-kwahyn, EK-wahyn\, adjective:

of, pertaining to, or resembling a horse: a bold, equine face.

They were very frustrated with the inability of the authorities to react, so they started Equine Rescue to try to deal with horse cruelty cases.
-- Sally Clampett

1778, from L. equinus, from equus "horse," from PIE base ekwos "horse"

bilk

bilk \bilk\, verb, noun:

1. to defraud; cheat
2. to frustrate
3. to escape from; elude
4. a trick; fraud; deceit.
5. a cheat, swindler

Stuart Levine is a guy who is accused of trying to bilk numerous state agencies - and people seeking help from government agencies - out of millions of dollars.
-- Steve Brown

by 1651, from the noun (1633), first used as a cribbage term. Origin obscure, it was believed in 17th century to be "a word signifying nothing," perhaps of Arab origin; but it is rather perhaps a thinned form of balk. Meaning "to defraud" is first recorded 1672.