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[tamaranth]

Test your Vocabulary. (I scored 44,300 but that may well be due to my fascination with obscure words. I loved their selection here).

we still don't have enough data for complete analysis by age or education level, especially because we have very little data for participants under 15. ... We especially need participation from children and teenagers, where the biggest vocabulary growth occurs, so families are key. (For little kids, obviously they'll need a parent or older sibiling to help!)

In praise of Joanne Rowling’s Hermione Granger series

It’s easy to imagine Hermione’s origin story as some warmed-over Star Wars claptrap, with tragically missing parents and unsatisfying parental substitutes and a realization that she belongs to a hidden order, with wondrous (and unsettlingly genetic) gifts. But, no: Hermione’s normal parents are her normal parents. She just so happens to be gifted. Being special, Rowling tells us, isn’t about where you come from; it’s about what you can do

(Now I want someone to write this, as a transformative work / homage / whatever)

Who holds the copyright to a photo taken by a monkey? (My immediate response: the tabloid that's employing the monkey, of course.)

Harry Potter and the Curse of Headache

Headache disorders are common in children and adolescents. Even young male Wizards are disabled by them. In this article we review Harry Potter's headaches as described in the biographical series by JK Rowling. Moreover, we attempt to classify them. Regrettably we are not privy to the Wizard system of classifying headache disorders and are therefore limited to the Muggle method, the International Classification of Headache Disorders, 2nd edition (ICHD-II).

(does this count as fanfic?)

How medieval armour influenced battles -- though ladymoonray and I recently saw a video of a chap in full armour climbing a ladder, doing jumping jacks, and generally being pretty mobile.

The Inner Dark -- horribly accurate depiction of depression, with happy ending. May be cathartic.

EDIT TO ADD
Doctor Who Tube Map - graphic representation of eleven Doctors and their companions, opponents etc.

Is it just me or is Chrome gobbling more and more resources lately?

Comments

[gummitch.livejournal.com]

41,500, but until they get more stats for the over-32s, I won't know if that's above or below average.

[tamaranth.livejournal.com]

can't find my way back to the stats page, but surely one can paste into Excel and do a pretty extrapolation? (There seems to be a fairly steady rate of increase : age ... )

there is a remarkably linear progression from 23,303 words (age 15) to 29,330 words (age 32), which works out to an average increase of 355 words per year, or almost exactly one new word a day (0.97 words to be precise).

(http://testyourvocab.com/blog.php)

[sbisson.livejournal.com]

44,100

Lots of Jack Vance and Gene Wolfe at an early age!

[hairyears.livejournal.com]

Apparently I have a vocabulary of 80 words.

Of course, it's possible that the quiz doesn't work on Opera Mobile on an Android phone; nevertheless, I should worry about expending half of my vocabulary in a single comment.

[doubtingmichael.livejournal.com]

Subnormality (aka Virus Comics) is excellent - steadily humane, amusing and intelligent. When I found it I went through the entire archive.