Summary: Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for April 07, 2014 is: spandex \SPAN-deks\ noun : any of various elastic textile fibers made chiefly of polyurethane; also : clothing made of this material Examples: While spandex is appropriate for running races and perhaps errands too, few of us can get away with donning it in the workplace. "[Olympic bobsled brakeman Chris] Fogt says his athletic life and his military career have some similarities, particularly the camaraderie forged in the trenches . 'For us, it's obviously slightly different. Your life's not in danger. At the same time, you're sliding down an icy track in a bathtub with four men in spandex. You get very close.'" From an article by Rick Maese in the Washington Post, February 24, 2014 Did you know? Spandex is a fiber that has had an impact on fashion high and low, casual and formal, outer and under. It's not a trademark, as a number of the names of other fibers are, among them "Dacron," "Lycra," and "Orlon." It's a generic term, coined in 1959 as an anagram of the word "expands." Anagrammatic coinages are not common; the only other in our dictionaries that the average person is likely to be familiar with is "sideburns." "Sideburns" is an anagram (and synonym) of "burnsides," from Ambrose E. Burnside, a Union general in the American Civil War credited with originating the fashion (in the U.S., at least) also known as "side-whiskers."
