oots

this is for all the other avid readers of order of the stick. this came as my word of the day email that i recieve. mr poni and i had many a debate about how to pronounce his name, and who knew it was an actual word?

élan \ay-LAHNG (the "NG" is not pronounced, but the vowel is nasalized)\ noun

: vigorous spirit or enthusiasm

Example sentence:
With all the requisite élan, our guest blessed the food, toasted the cook, carved the roast turkey, served it around, and ate multiple helpings of everything.

Did you know?
Once upon a time, English speakers did not have "élan" (the word, that is; that's not to say we haven't always had potential for vigourous spirit). We had, however, "elance," a verb meaning "to hurl" that was used specifically for throwing lances and darts. "Elance" derived down the line from Middle French "(s')eslancer," meaning "to rush" or "dash" (that is, "to hurl oneself forth"). With the decline of lance-throwing, we tossed out "elance" a century and half ago. Just about that time we found "élan," a noun that traces to "(s')eslancer." We copied "élan" in form from the French, but we dispensed with the French sense of a literal "rush" or "dash," retaining the sense of enthusiastic animation that we sometimes characterize as "dash."

*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.