14-letter words containing a, r, k, h, n
- rock mechanics — the study of the mechanical behaviour of rocks, esp their strength, elasticity, permeability, porosity, density, and reaction to stress
- scratch monkey — (humour) As in "Before testing or reconfiguring, always mount a scratch monkey", a proverb used to advise caution when dealing with irreplaceable data or devices. Used to refer to any scratch volume hooked to a computer during any risky operation as a replacement for some precious resource or data that might otherwise get trashed. This term preserves the memory of Mabel, the Swimming Wonder Monkey, star of a biological research program at the University of Toronto. Mabel was not (so the legend goes) your ordinary monkey; the university had spent years teaching her how to swim, breathing through a regulator, in order to study the effects of different gas mixtures on her physiology. Mabel suffered an untimely demise one day when a DEC engineer troubleshooting a crash on the program's VAX inadvertently interfered with some custom hardware that was wired to Mabel. It is reported that, after calming down an understandably irate customer sufficiently to ascertain the facts of the matter, a DEC troubleshooter called up the field circus manager responsible and asked him sweetly, "Can you swim?" Not all the consequences to humans were so amusing; the sysop of the machine in question was nearly thrown in jail at the behest of certain clueless droids at the local "humane" society. The moral is clear: When in doubt, always mount a scratch monkey. A corespondent adds: The details you give are somewhat consistent with the version I recall from the Digital "War Stories" notesfile, but the name "Mabel" and the swimming bit were not mentioned, IIRC. Also, there's a very detailed account that claims that three monkies died in the incident, not just one. I believe Eric Postpischil wrote the original story at DEC, so his coming back with a different version leads me to wonder whether there ever was a real Scratch Monkey incident.
- shakespeareana — collected writings or items relating to Shakespeare
- shankaracharya — a.d. 789?–821? Hindu Vedantist philosopher and teacher.
- shark-infested — (of a body of water) known to contain large numbers of sharks, and therefore considered to be dangerous
- shooting brake — station wagon.
- shrink-wrapped — A shrink-wrapped product is sold in a tight covering of thin plastic.
- siberian husky — one of a Siberian breed of medium-size dogs having a thick, soft coat, raised originally as sled dogs.
- stalking horse — If you describe a person or thing as a stalking horse, you mean that it is being used to obtain a temporary advantage so that someone can get what they really want.
- stalking-horse — a horse, or a figure of a horse, behind which a hunter hides in stalking game.
- the milk train — a very early morning train, that traditionally transported milk, on which passengers also travelled
- track lighting — lighting for a room or other area in which individual spotlight fixtures are attached along a narrow, wall- or ceiling-mounted metal track through which current is conducted, permitting flexible positioning of the lights.
- turkish angora — a long-haired breed of cat, similar to the Persian
- walking shorts — medium to long shorts, often cut fuller than Bermuda shorts and used for walking or leisure activity.