Word: absurder
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...industry executives are no dummies. They try to outsmart their opponents by claiming they're better for the environment than the environmentalists. Tisdale quotes a pamphlet issued by the Caterpillar company--manufacturer of bulldozers and cranes needed to remove the Northwest's oldest trees--as an example of this absurd attempt to fool those opposed to the clearcutting: "The Facts Say: Forests do not necessarily improve with age. Decaying stands lack the food resources animals require. Density of old stands blocks sunlight, discouraging new growth...
...home precinct, Independence, Missouri. Truman's daughter Margaret accused Bush of being a "political plagiarist." Truman biographer David McCullough diplomatically cast some light on the issue. "If George Bush is taking inspiration from Truman, that is one thing," he said. "If he is saying 'I'm Truman,' that's absurd...
...about the made-at-home shampoo that attracts flies) as well as depressing ones (Ping-Pong paddles used for oars by desperate rafters fleeing to Miami). The author's encounter with the grouchy Cuban TV chef Nitza Villapol, who teaches a country without food how to cook, is deliciously absurd. Oppenheimer adroitly picks up nuances: for example, how , in a country with no food, everybody's main concern seems to be getting deodorant and toothpaste. From Jose, a welder in Cienfuegos, he learns the sign language used when discussing the forbidden subject of Fidel: an imaginary beard drawn with...
...Detroit to Paris, a wave of raves is overtaking conventional night life with unbridled energy and a brash new sound. Part funky fashion show, part techno music dance-a-thon, part politically correct flea market, raves are loopy high-tech love-ins laced with a playful sense of the absurd (and with a dollop of illicit drugs...
Long before the demise of the Soviet Union, Russians learned to dismiss as absurd the civil defense training courses imposed on them at school and work. They refer to the courses as grob, taken from the first two letters of the words for civil defense -- grazhdanskaya oborona. Translation of grob: coffin. The cynicism was justified. In 1988 an accidental air-raid alert in the industrial city of Perm sent hundreds of thousands of people scrambling for safety. As a test of civil defense, the accident proved a disaster. Perm residents found many shelters locked, flooded or infested with mosquitoes...