Horizontal Fall

Jake wondered if his kids moods and emotions were lunitidal: every four weeks Penny seemed like a gamine, fraught with piffle and audacity; Vinnie seemed sequacious and veracious; Ira, usually irascible, was more urbane; and Terry, though he remained procrustean, seemed also torpid and giddy.

lunitidal (LOO-nih-TIDE-l) adj. Of or relating to tidal phenomena caused by the moon.

gamine (gaa-MEEN, gaam-EEN) n. 1. An often homeless girl who roams about the streets; an urchin. 2. A girl or woman of impish appeal. —gamine adj.

fraught (frawt) adj. 1. Filled with a specified element or elements; charged. 2. Marked by or causing distress; emotional. —n. Scots Freight; cargo.

piffle (PIHF-uhl) intr.v. To talk or act feebly or futilely. —n. Foolish or futile talk or ideas; nonsense.

audacity (aw-DAAS-ih-tee) n. 1. Fearless daring; intrepidity. 2. Bold or insolent heedlessness of restraints, as of those imposed by prudence, propriety, or convention. 3. An act or instance of intrepidity or insolent heedlessness.

sequacious (sih-KWAY-shuhs) adj. 1. Persisting ni a continuous intellectual or stylistic direction. 2a. Disposted to follow another or others, as a leader. b. Slavishly unthinking and uncritical.

veracious (vuh-RAY-shuhs) adj. 1. Honest; truthful. 2. Accurate; precise. —veraciously adv. —veraciousness n.

irascible (ih-RAAS-uh-buhl, eye-raas-) adj. 1. Prone to outbursts of temper; easily angered. 2. Characterized by or resulting from anger. —irascibility, —irascibleness n. —irascibly adv.

urbane (ur-BAYN) adj. Polite, refined, and often elegant in manner. —urbanely adv.

procrustean (phruh-KRUHS-hee-uhn) adj. Marked by arbitrary often ruthless disregard of individual differences or special circumstances.
DID YOU KNOW?
Procrustes was one of many villains defeated by the Greek hero Theseus. According to Greek mythology, Procrustes ambushed travelers and, after robbing them, would kill them in a most unusual way. He would make his victims lie on an iron bed and would then force them to fit the bed by severing the parts that hung off the ends or stretching those that were too short. Something “Procrustean,” therefore, takes no account of individual differences but cruelly and mercilessly makes everything the same. And a “procrustean bed” is a scheme or pattern into which someone or something is arbitrarily forced.

torpid (TAWR-pihd) adj. 1. Deprived of the power of motion or feeling; benumbed. 2. Dormant; hibernating. 3. Lethargic; apathetic.