passel

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The Word of the Day for December 21 is: 

passel   \PASS-ul\   noun
          : a large number or amount 
 

Example sentence:
          Knowing that there will be a passel of phone and e-mail messages to 
deal with, Rob is dreading going back to work after his two-week vacation.

Did you know?
          Loss of the sound of "r" after a vowel and before another consonant 
in the middle of a word is common in spoken English. This linguistic 
idiosyncrasy has given our language a few new words, including "cuss" from 
"curse," "bust" from "burst," and our featured word "passel" from "parcel." The 
spelling "passel" originated in the 15th century, but the word's use as a 
collective noun for an indefinite number is a 19th-century Americanism. It was 
common primarily in local-color writing before getting a boost in the 1940s, 
when it began appearing in popular weekly magazines such as _Time_, _Newsweek_, 
and the _Saturday Review_.





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