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Jul 7, 2020
This week’s themeShirts and pants as metaphors This week’s words redshirt smarty-pants sansculotte descamisado bloody shirt 
A.Word.A.Day
with Anu Gargsmarty-pants
PRONUNCIATION:
(SMAR-tee-pants)
MEANING:
noun: Someone who presents as being obnoxiously clever.
ETYMOLOGY:
From smart, from Old English smeart + pants, short for pantaloons, plural
of pantaloon. St. Pantaleone/Pantalone was a popular saint in Venice. As a
result, it was also a common name among the Venetians. As a result, a comic
character in the Italian commedia dell’arte was named Pantalone. The leggings
this character wore became known as pantalone (plural pantaloni). And that
became pantaloons in English. Earliest documented use: 1932.
USAGE:
“There’s satisfaction in seeing a smarty-pants taken down a peg.” Hadley Freeman; The Critical Drubbing for Will Self’s Book Shows There’s a Subtle Art to Memoir; The Guardian (London, UK); Nov 16, 2019. A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:
People's souls are like gardens. You can't turn your back on someone
because his garden's full of weeds. You have to give him water and lots of
sunshine. -Nancy Farmer, author (b. 7 Jul 1941)
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