Are you ready to learn today? Great! We can all pick up some new words thanks to Kathy at Bermuda Onion and her Wondrous Words Wednesday meme.
My new vocabulary word comes from the novel Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein. Set during World War II, it is a story of deep friendship, told by a young woman who is a British spy and has been captured by the Germans. She writes her confession for the Gestapo as a story, and that’s the story we read.
Early in Code Name Verity, a group of British women who have signed up to help the war effort hide in a shelter during an air raid.
A couple of them had had some sense to grab their cigarettes. They passed them ’round, parsimoniously sharing.
Parsimonious is definitely one of those words I know I studied in school and forgot from lack 
of use.
parsimonious \pär-sə-‘mō-nē-əs\ adj; parsimoniously = adv; from the Latin parsus and parcere, to spare; exhibiting or marked by parsimony, the quality of being careful with money or resources; stingy, thrifty
With this definition in mind, I’m guessing the women reluctantly shared their cigarettes, letting each person only take one.
Word Nerd Workout
Think of a parsimonious character and write a sentence about him or her. My example:
Ebeneezer Scrooge ran his business parsimoniously, counting out his profits at the end of each day.
Your turn!
Thanks for stopping by!
Julia
oooohhhh…great word. I will have to use it more. Never read that book, but it looks wonderful! I just finished, “The Aviator’s Wife” about Charles and Anne Lindbergh (fantastic) and Charles definitely had a parsimonious personality; he traveled light, never stored anything extra, and praise was seldom. Thanks for the word stretch!
Mr Bennet was always parsimonious in his praise of Mrs Bennet.
Good one, Brona.
“Harriet Oleson parsimoniously gave Caroline Ingalls less pay for her eggs when she knew they were worth more.”(Little House)
I like this words. 😉 Have a good day! Hester,
Harriet was always such a pain, wasn’t she? Thanks Hester!
I thought of Ebeneezer Scrooge too. My mother lived through the depression so she’s pretty parsimonious.
What a great word! Something crazy: my granny, a little country lady with a 6th grade education, used to use this word! I smiled as soon as I saw it in your post title 🙂
Happily (although I did not realize it at the time), Latin was still a mandatory subject for me in grade 10, making it difficult for me to forget such words as parsimonious, puerile, & pulchritude. 😉
While the Earl of Dorincourt was parsimonious with his affection for his grandson’s mother, he was drawn to Little Lord Fauntleroy.
Extended family members often accuse my husband and me of being parsiminous with our hard-earned money. I like to think to of it differently: we’re not stingy, we’re just smart! It’s how we can afford to go on some amazing trips with our girls.
I agree Nicole- nothing wrong with “being careful with money”
I LOVED Code Name Verity. It was so fabulously brilliant and twisty. Even when I KNEW the narrator was lying, I could not tell where. The book also broke my heart. I’d love to read it again, but I don’t know if I can.
Parsimonious is a wonderful word.
Thanks Dianne. I’m honestly struggling with it a little- it drags for me. But maybe I should be paying closer attention. Thanks!