bifurcated - past participle. divided into two branches or forks.
I first saw this word in a Face Book post is late 2020. Bud Willis is a dear family friend, and retired stock broker. His comment was in reference to the stock market, and described the duality, and general lack of focus of the market and investors at that time. The big question was, where would it go from there? Commodities roared back from a 40% decline directly related to the covid virus. Bud was offering reasons why the bull market may not be sustainable, and used the term, "bifurcated." I had a good idea what it meant, but googled it anyway. Since that day, the word pops into my head from time to time. Had the market been described as fractured, splintered, unfocused, random, or bi-polar, I think I could have handled it better, but bifurcated??
Why does this word cause me problems?
I have never used the term in spoken or written form. Ok, here goes..."Even my train of thought is bifurcated as to using this word in a spoken conversation." Safe to say I will not. Seeing it written again is more than enough.
Prolific - adjective - fruitful. causing abundant growth. marked by abundant inventiveness or productivity.
This word is a "made it" word. Dan Miller, the long time anchor on Nashville's channel 4 news, is described on his wikipedia page as "a prolific writer of essays about life on and off the television screen." If you remember Dan, you will enjoy his blog.
https://danmiller.typepad.com/dan_millers_notebook/
There are over 200 entries, stretching across 5 years. Dan wrote weekly, and sometimes, daily. I don't know about you, but I'd be hard pressed to be described as prolific in anything. That consistency, and discipline is something I'm envious of.
Allelopathy - noun - The inhibition of one plant, (or other organism) by another, due to the release into the environment of substances acting as germination or growth inhibitors.
This is the opposite of fertilizer, or other materials that build up the soil, and encourage growth in plants, and other organisms.
One plant survives and thrives, by restricting or prohibiting the growth of another plant.
Black Walnut trees are good at this. So are oak trees and a variety of other plants. There is a list of plants below and a more detailed explanation at this link.
https://www.gardeningknowhow.com/garden-how-to/info/allelopathic-plants.htm
In discussing this with a customer where I work, we were talking about growing good grass beneath oak trees, and how difficult that can be. He tossed this word, allelopathy, out there. I nodded like I understood, then wrote it down to look it up later.
Thriving by restricting the success of others...My mind went immediately to toxic people and personality types I have worked with. Some of them could be allelopathic world grand champions.
Very thankful that I am wound up to be an encourager, cheerleader, and team player, rather than a natural Allelopath!