I Love Katherine Barber (even with a "K")

It doesn't matter to me if I sound like a nerd. I did get in to law school, after all, and that must mean something. So I don't care if I sound like a nerd when I say: dictionaries are wonderful things. I myself am partial to the Canadian Oxford and if you don't know who Katherine is, you can google her.

A list of the words I've looked up in the past 24 or so hours, pretty much in the order I found them:

Fiat: 1 formal authorization. 2 a decree or order. [Latin, 'let it be done']. I love this word for so many reasons (but I never fail to forget its definition)!

Vitiate: 1 impair the quality or efficiency of; corrupt, debase, contaminate. 2 make invalid or ineffectual. I looked this one up to confirm that the first 't' was pronounced "sh". I was right.

Blandishment: flattery; cajolery. Who knew? McLachlin J, that's who!

Buss: n. a kiss * v.tr. kiss. Is a kiss by any other name still a kiss?

Oleomargarine: N. American dated = Margarine. Apparently there once was (and probably still is) a Canadian Statute that dealt with oleomargarine productions somewhere in Atlantic Canada.

Lodestar: 1 a star that a ship etc. is steered by, esp. the pole star. 2 a a guiding principle. b and object of pursuit.

If I ever want to become a judge, I must absolutely start work now on my own collection of obscure-ish words. But welcome to this, the first ever post of Interesting Words I've Found In Case Law, a collection of other people's obscure-ish words.