“I have also learned why people work so hard to succeed: It is because they envy the things their neighbors have. But it is useless. It is like chasing the wind….It is better to have only a little, with peace of mind, than be busy all the time iwth both hands, trying to catch the wind.”

Ecclesiastes 4:4,6

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I used to complete this exercise for my english class my freshmen year of highschool. I think it helps to build one’s vocabulary. Excuse the verbosity of the sentence–it couldn’t be helped.

Today’s vocabulary words:

ominous – forboding; of a usually bad omen
apace – swiftly
plenary – full; complete
ostensibly – apparently
lampoon – a satire or written attack
quid pro quo – an equal exchange
abrogate – to abloish or do away with
annul – to obliterate the existence of

The ominous nimbi were ostensible signs of a storm approaching apace. Quickening, they annulled the calm skies in a wave, sweeping with ferocity like evening shadows to light. Recalling a meteorologist’s report of fair and clement skies, I vowed to lampoon the man in a scathing editorial in the school’s newspaper–it seemed an acceptable quid pro quo for my inconvenience. The skies poured forth divine waters which abrogated any hope for a pastoral outing that day. I wondered at the hand that might weild such plenary powers shaping fate and the course of a man’s day.