1. curiosity
   friendship
2. low status
   scorn

This word also has a legal meaning. "Contempt of court" is a charge that means a person is not cooperating as required with a court proceeding, and can result in jail time.

1. credulous
   eager to fight
2. mountainous
   resembling a dog

This word comes to us from the Latin "pugnare," or "to fight." It's related to the word "pugilist," a fancy term for "fighter."

1. the last in a set of numbers
   a commonly-repeated proverb
2. an organism that is half-developed
   something that seems like it can't be true, but is

A well-known one is the French paradox. The traditional French diet includes a lot of fat (oh, those cheeses!), but they have a low rate of heart disease. It's thought to have to do with their consumption of olive oil and red wine, smaller portions, and active lifestyles.

1. advanced beyond one's years
   lively
2. low-priced
   high-priced

It's usually children or teenagers who are thought of as precocious. They could be clever, emotionally mature or unusually talented.

1. dark-complexioned
   athletic
2. humorous
   thoughtful

If you got this one right off, you might have been helped by the "Harry Potter" books. Remember the "pensieve" in Dumbledore's study? It was where he held his memories for later review.

1. a bike with one gear
   a single-railed train track
2. an eyeglass for just one eye
   a piece of land under sole ownership

When monocles went out of fashion, filmgoers were deprived of a great sight gag: the toff who is drinking at his club when a shocking sight makes his eyes widen and his monocle fall into his martini.

1. train of thought, mental chatter
   specific location
2. unknown cause
   a way of speaking specific to a group or culture

What separates "idiom" from "dialect"? The second one is often geographical; "idiom" is for speakers united by something else. Gen-Zers might have a certain idiom; so would wine aficionados, and so on.

1. dark in color
   fake
2. humorous
   youthful

This word comes to us from German, and gained popularity in the World Wars, where shortages required a number of "ersatz" products, like coffee and flour. (Thanks to Merriam-Webster's site for this bit of etymological trivia).

1. frightening
   like or of a forest
2. rotund
   unlikely to be true

The romantic poems of yesteryear are full of "bosky glades." It is etymologically related to "bush."

1. between transparent and opaque
   growing quickly
2. dimly lit
   well-known

This word uses the prefix "trans-" and the Latin word "lux" to mean a substance that lets light through, but is not transparent. You can only see through a translucent substance in a cloudy, obscure way.

1. to compensate
   to lift overhead
2. to understand completely
   to touch or feel in an exploratory way

You most often find this used in a medical setting, like a doctor palpating for a tumor. However, it makes us wonder about the name of "Emperor Palpatine" in the Star Wars movies. Maybe he was a serial groper?

1. active in the daytime
   happening once a week
2. frequent
   vessel

"Diurnal" is the less-used companion to "nocturnal." Actually, it's used as frequently in animal biology and related fields, but it just hasn't made its way into everyday language the way "nocturnal" has, perhaps because of our fascination with night and its phenomena.

1. completely resistant
   short-lived
2. seen from a distance
   tone-deaf

You might hear about a person being "impervious to criticism." It's also used in relation to water; for example, in water-repelling fabrics.

1. funny
   fat
2. short
   sexual in theme and tone

Entertainments are usually described as "bawdy." Often, there's a comic sense to the word, but not necessarily. A dance revue where you'll see a lot of skin can be described as "bawdy" even if it's not funny.

1. expensive
   attractive
2. pre-sorted
   shared by a group

"Collective" is often used in the meaning of "workers' collective," in which a group shares both tasks and earnings. Or in "collective memory," an idea from psychology in which a group with a shared history has shared memories.

1. a glow or shine
   a long trip
2. to prop up
   to fail to understand

This sounds like it could be a verb, but it's a noun. It's often used as the phrase, "lose its luster," meaning that the shine has gone off something once desirable.

1. division of cells
   farsightedness
2. marriage to two people at once
   talent for music

You might be more familiar with the term "polygamy," which means, "married to several people at once." That word comes up in the news whenever the government cracks down on a separatist religious group that practices it.

1. to cause to not happen
   to make a path smooth
2. to serve as as a prologue (in a movie or play)
   to make space for something

You might be most familiar with this phrase as "pre-emptive strike." That term originated in military language, and means to attack an opponent before they attack you.

1. related to autumn
   related to spring
2. related to summer
   related to winter

This one is easy to remember because of the vernal equinox. That's the day in springtime when night and day are of equal length.

1. to devise or create, usually with difficulty
   to be dishonest
2. to survive
   to think hard about (something)

If somebody "contrived" to get a job, you know it wasn't just a matter of filling out an application. This word can have a negative meaning: In a review, a movie's "contrived plot" is not a good thing.

1. having to do with cartoons
   having to do with laws
2. having to do with maps
   having to do with zoos

A cartographer makes maps. The word comes from the French "carte," for "card," and is related to the name "Magna Carta."

1. related to vehicles
   happening without conscious effort
2. happening regularly
   the science of consciousness

When a bodily function is "autonomic," it happens without conscious control. Fun fact: Most people would say that the balancing of one's head on one's neck is autonomic, but it's not. What happens when you start to fall asleep in church or during a lecture? Your head tips over!

1. fearful
   in like-new condition
2. parabolic in shape
   see-through

You'll often hear this word in the sense of "pristine beach" or "pristine forest." Some word lovers object to this because these parts of nature, no matter how clean, are millions of years old, and therefore not in "like-new" condition.

1. to encircle
   to pass up (an opportunity or similar)
2. to precede
   to prevent

"Forego" and "forgo" are often mixed up. The second term means "to pass up or give up" something. It's really unfair how alike these two words are.

1. to define narrowly or quibble over a definition
   to be vigiliant
2. to feed generously
   to trim back

"Parse" had a heyday during the Monica Lewinsky scandal. Talking heads on cable news were always referring to "parsing" President Clinton's statements, especially, "It depends on what the meaning of 'is' is."

1. to discount
   to seek promotion or advancement
2. to promote or spread
   irresponsible with money

This word gained unexpected prominence in mid-2018 when President Trump used it in a tweet. He used it in relations to "Fake News," which should surprise no one following the president's Twitter feed.

1. informal language
   related to nearsightedness
2. related to farsightedness
   perfectly round

Surprise! This is not an adjective, despite the -r ending. Vernacular is everyday or nonstandard language, but not quite slang. For example, "parameter" is a specific word from computer science, but in everyday speech, it just means a defining boundary.

1. to consume alcohol only lightly
   to make an absurd suggestion
2. to make out or cuddle
   to splash around in a bath or pond

This old-fashioned and whimsical word doesn't get a lot of use today. It still comes into play as a euphemism, when the speaker can't bring himself or herself to say anything more explicit.

1. ocean blue
   easily broken
2. old-fashioned
   sincere

"Cerulean" often comes into play describing the ocean or a sea. But you'll also find it in romantic novels, usually describing a heroine's eye color.

1. coming third in order
   related to soil
2. high-risk
   low-risk

We're used to hearing "primary" and "secondary," especially in medical settings. However, if you hear someone refer to a "tertiary effect," it's one that comes third in severity, or perhaps third in time of onset.

1. beautiful
   extraordinary
2. ordinary
   shaped like a star

Don't confuse this with "stellar." That more broadly used term means "like or of a star" and can also mean "outstanding." But "stellate" is specifically for star-shaped things. Exit wounds from gunshots, for example, can be stellate.

1. quick to laugh
   given to anger
2. thin
   round

"Choler" was one of the four bodily "humours" that supposedly gave people their dispositions -- at least, according to early European thought. Choler was a fluid which, if it was dominant in one's body, made a person quick to get angry.

1. to repel an attacker
   to unclog, as in a sink
2. to unwrap, as in a gift
   to throw from a window

This comes to us from the Latin 'finistra,' meaning window. In early modern Europe, unpopular political leaders were sometimes killed by defenestration; it was like an early-retirement plan without the golden parachute.

1. a cooking method involving steaming
   a glade of trees and bushes
2. a person who enjoys watching sports
   a person who is new to having money or position

The French call this either "arriviste" or "noveau riche." It's the sort of person who can afford the sailboat, but doesn't fit in at the Marina Club.

1. bristly
   half-asleep
2. in love
   traveling widely

Aristotle and his disciples were known as the peripatetic philosophers, not because they traveled widely, but because they walked back and forth as they debated. To this day, "peripatetic" the common adjective is as likely to mean "walking a lot" as it is "globetrotting."