14-letter words containing h, a, r, k
- poikilothermia — Medicine/Medical. the inability to regulate core body temperature (as by sweating to cool off or by putting on clothes to warm up), found especially in some spinal cord injury patients and in patients under general anesthesia.
- pre-earthquake — a series of vibrations induced in the earth's crust by the abrupt rupture and rebound of rocks in which elastic strain has been slowly accumulating.
- rathke's pouch — an invagination of stomodeal ectoderm developing into the anterior lobe of the pituitary gland.
- recklinghausen — a city in NW Rhine-Westphalia, in Germany.
- rock mechanics — the study of the mechanical behaviour of rocks, esp their strength, elasticity, permeability, porosity, density, and reaction to stress
- rough as sacks — uncouth
- sakha republic — an administrative division in E Russia, in NE Siberia on the Arctic Ocean: the coldest inhabited region of the world; it has rich mineral resources. Capital: Yakutsk. Pop: 948 100 (2002). Area: 3 103 200 sq km (1 197 760 sq miles)
- 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.
- shaker heights — a city in NE Ohio, near Cleveland.
- 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
- sheepback rock — roche moutonnée.
- shock absorber — a device for damping sudden and rapid motion, as the recoil of a spring-mounted object from shock.
- 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.
- sickle feather — one of the paired, elongated, sickle-shaped, middle feathers of the tail of the rooster.
- squeak through — to succeed, get through, survive, etc. by a narrow margin or with difficulty
- 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.
- starch blocker — a substance ingested in the belief that it inhibits the body's ability to metabolize starch and thereby promotes weight loss: declared illegal in the U.S. by the FDA.
- straight poker — one of the original forms of poker in which players are dealt five cards face down, upon which they bet and then have the showdown without drawing any cards.
- straightjacket — to put in or as in a straitjacket: Her ambition was straitjacketed by her family.
- strike a light — to ignite something, esp a match, by friction
- surgical shock — a state of shock that can occur during or after surgery
- szekesfehervar — a city in W central Hungary.
- tailor's chalk — hardened chalk or soapstone used to make temporary guide marks on a garment that is being altered.
- take the chair — to preside as chairman for a meeting, etc
- take the floor — that part of a room, hallway, or the like, that forms its lower enclosing surface and upon which one walks.
- the great trek — the migration of Boer farmers with their slaves and African servants from the Cape Colony to the north and east from about 1836 to 1845 to escape British authority
- the job market — the people who are looking for work and the jobs available for them to do
- the kama sutra — an ancient Hindu text on erotic pleasure and other topics
- the milk train — a very early morning train, that traditionally transported milk, on which passengers also travelled
- the upper back — the part of the back between the shoulders
- the-peacemaker — (Albert Edward"the Peacemaker") 1841–1910, king of Great Britain and Ireland 1901–10 (son of Queen Victoria).
- 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.
- trickle charge — a continuous, slow charge supplied to a storage battery to keep it in a fully charged state.
- turkish angora — a long-haired breed of cat, similar to the Persian
- up to the mark — acceptably good
- walking shorts — medium to long shorts, often cut fuller than Bermuda shorts and used for walking or leisure activity.
- white charlock — a related plant, Raphanus raphanistrum, with yellow, mauve, or white flowers and podlike fruits
- whitetip shark — Also called reef whitetip shark. a smooth dogfish, Triaenodon obseus, having white-tipped dorsal and caudal fins and occurring inshore among the reefs in the Pacific and Indian oceans and the Red Sea.