Bespoke

"English Cut: The website of Thomas Mahon, bespoke savile row tailor, London."
[from blog banner text*]

ADJECTIVE: 1. Custom-made. Said especially of clothes. 2. Making or selling custom-made clothes: a bespoke tailor.
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Pyrrhic victory

"Any momentary triumph you think gained through argument is really a Pyrrhic victory: The resentment and ill will you stir up is stronger and lasts longer than any momentary change of opinion."
[The 48 Laws of Power by Robert Greene and Joost Elffers*]

NOUN: A victory that is offset by staggering losses.
ETYMOLOGY: After Pyrrhus, King of Epirus (306–302 and 297–272) who defeated the Romans at Heraclea (280) and Asculum (279) despite his own staggering losses.
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Plenitude

"She is warm, her hair is silken, and she nestles perfectly into the curve of your torso. You experience something like plenitude..."
[NY Times OpEd by Judith Warner, "I Love Them, I Love Him Not"*]

NOUN: 1. An ample amount or quantity; an abundance: a region blessed with a plenitude of natural resources. 2. The condition of being full, ample, or complete.
ETYMOLOGY: Middle English, from Old French, from Latin, full.
OTHER FORMS: pleni·tudi·nous —ADJECTIVE
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Rapacious

"Grievances, including friction between kitchen and dining room staff, rapacious management and near-universal bitterness over tipping, are being revealed with gusto on the Internet by restaurant staff members."
[NY Times, "The Waiter You Stiffed Has Not Forgotten" by Julia Moskin*]

ADJECTIVE: 1. Taking by force; plundering. 2. Greedy; ravenous. See synonyms at voracious. 3. Subsisting on live prey.
ETYMOLOGY: From Latin, from rapere, to seize.
OTHER FORMS: ra·pacious·ly —ADVERB
ra·paci·ty, ra·pacious·ness —NOUN
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Congeries

"Their (the abandoned children of Nishi-Sugamo) tale is a rich, awful congeries of primal and distinctly modern fears, from the universal childhood fantasy of parental abandonment to the more grown-up suspicion that big cities are places of cruel isolation and indifference."
[NY Times movie review]

NOUN: A collection; an aggregation (used with a sing. verb)
From Latin, congerere, to heap up.
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