[Fictionary] Groke!--Eric wins

[David Randall]

*David Comment*: I like these Britannic monosyllables because they could be
*anything*, and it encourages a wide range of guesses. I note that while
this word is mentioned in many websites, I would not be entirely surprised
to discover someone had made it up recently and was trying to fob it off as
an antique.

______________________________

groke (n.) - 1. A large, stocky marsh thrush with a similar shape to the
blackbird, once commonly found in the Norfolk Broads but now endangered. 2.
A woman suited for hard, physical labor.

*Some men are remarkable for taking uncommon good care of themselves,
fastidious and precise and unobjectionable to all who behold them;  such a
man Groke was not.*

*Elizabeth: 1 (Elliott) = 1*

Elliott: The quotation sounds Dickensian to me, but it makes Groke a man,
whereas the definition refers specifically to a woman.
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groke (n.) - 1. A self-serious martinet. 2. A horse that bites.

*"I am a determined character," said Mr. Groke. "That’s what I am. I do my
duty. That’s what I do. My flesh and blood" --- he looked at Mrs. Groke as
he said this --- "when it rises against me, is not my flesh and blood. I
discard it."*

*Ranjit = 2 (JimMosk) + 1 (RealGuess) = 3*

Eric: "Nice Dickens."

Elliott: This, too, sounds Dickensian (like Jerry Cruncher to his son, but
with r's).

Pierre: "Martinet" is a false friend in Catalan. In French and English, it
means a martin or swift (which are unrelated; martins are swallows, which
are passerines, but swifts are not), but in Catalan, it means a heron.
----------------------------------------------------
groke (adj.) - Excessively sad of manner and speech; lugubrious.

*At the wake I paid my final respects to headmaster Groke, whose black
funeral garb seemed scarcely different from his quotidian attire.*

*Jim = 2 (Ranjit) + 1 (Elizabeth) = 3*
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groke (adj.) - Forbidding in external appearance, but friendly within.

*On arriving before the battlements, I found the Union Jack flying and
the drawbridge up, but undeterred by this show of defiance and resistance,
I rang at the gate, and was admitted to the Castle by Groke in a most
pacific manner.*

*Pierre: 2 (Elliott) + 2 (RealGuess) = 4*

Eric: "Tsundere."

Elizabeth: A Union Flag on battlements, never a Union Jack.   The Jack is
the name of the flag in maritime context only.   Surprisingly, most Britons
would also get this wrong.   It even came up in an episode of Dr Who once.

Elliott: Could also be Dickensian, if the castle isn't a literal castle.
Someone in _Great Expectations_ had a house in the burbs that he called the
Castle; maybe his name really was Groke?
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groke (adj.) - 1. Meticulously clean. 2. Polished to a shine.

*"Groke-right and ship-shape! Ha-ha!" was Prencerbook's call every morning.
We were to tumble out then, and set to scouring until he was satisfied.
Besides this, there was assembly and prayers, before the dubious pleasure
of soured bread or, on the coldest days, burnt porridge, for us boys to
break our fasts upon.*

*Eric = 2 (Linda) + 2 (Elizabeth) + 2 (RealGuess) + 1 (JimMosk) + 1
(Pierre) = 8*
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groke (n.) - 1. The Spitzbergen gray walrus, Cethippus griseus. 2. One who
smokes two cigars at once. 3. An ambitious bachelor clergyman who pays
court to the daughters of two different bishops.

*Thereupon the Reverend Mr. Groke betook himself, his cause, and
his mustache out of the amazed solictor's office and, with
seeming indifference to the December winds which played at leap-frog on
the cobblestones, waddled imperiously off to the Embankment, where,
having first perforated the ice with his tusks, he plunged back into
the Thames.*

*Elliott = 1 (Linda) + 1 (Eric) = 2*

Eric: "Ha! Ridiculous! I like thinking about the cigars and the walrus!"

Pierre: This sounds like Elliot. There is no genus Cethippus in Odobenidae;
all modern walruses belong to the genus Odobenus.

Elliott: I do not think there is any Dickensian novel in which one of
the characters is an actual walrus, but in my mind's eye I see the one from
Lewis Carroll's ``The Walrus and the Carpenter''.  It might have been more
convincing if I'd left the period off the ``Mr.''.
----------------------------------------------------
groke (v.) - 1. To gaze at somebody while they're eating in
the hope that they'll give you some of their food.

*Thin-cheeked Sam Groke slouched up to the fire and cast his piteous eyes
upon me.*

*Real = 2 (Eric) + 2 (Pierre) + 1 (Ranjit) = 5*

Eric: A sentiment I can identify with.
----------------------------------------------------
Ranjit: And kudos* to everyone for excellent dickensian quotations.
* Kudos have no monetary or point value. For amusement purposes only. Void
where prohibited by law.
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