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May 27, 2003

This week's theme
Metallic words used as metaphors

This week's words
goldbrick
silver bullet
brassy
leaden
tin ear

“There is no material with which human beings work which has so much potential energy as words.” ~Earnest Calkins
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silver bullet

noun: A quick solution to a thorny problem.

[From the belief that werewolves could be killed when shot with silver bullets.]

"Writing code, he (Stuart Feldman) explains, is like writing poetry: every word, each placement counts. Except that software is harder, because digital poems can have millions of lines which are all somehow interconnected. Try fixing programming errors, known as bugs, and you often introduce new ones. So far, he laments, nobody has found a silver bullet to kill the beast of complexity."
Survey: The Beast of Complexity; The Economist (London, UK); Apr 14, 2001.

"The Florida Republican warned recently that a new identity card suggested by Canadian Immigration Minister Denis Coderre is unlikely to resolve a thorny issue about how tightly Canadians will be screened at the border. `A national identity card is not a silver bullet,' (Porter) Goss said."
Kelly Toughill; National ID Cards 'No Silver Bullet'; The Toronto Star (Canada); Mar 4, 2003.

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