die of exposure

May 7のJapan Times Onlineの記事から引用します。
Two climbers die of exposure, others rescued from Japan Alps
Two men died of exposure while climbing a mountain in the Northern Alps in central Japan, police said Tuesday, as a string of mountain-climbing accidents were reported across the nation on the last day of the Golden Week holiday period.
"die of exposure" ですが、山の遭難なので激しい風雨あるいは雪や冷たい空気にさらされた事は容易に想像できます。　記事の先を読みます。
The police said the two who froze to death during a climb up the 3,190-meter Mount Hotaka, which straddles Gifu and Nagano prefectures, were Osamu Gorai, a 46-year-old company employee, and Kazunori Motozu, a 68-year-old who worked at an orthopedic clinic. Both were from Ibaraki Prefecture.
"die of exposure" で凍死したことが分かります。別のグループも低温症と疲労で助けを求めてきたと報告しています。
A separate group of alpinists climbing the mountain from the Nagano side sought help from police early Tuesday after three men and two women, whose ages ranged from the 20s to 60s, could not move due to hypothermia and exhaustion. All eight were rescued by helicopter and did not sustain any life-threatening injury, the police said.
さて、"exposure" のこの様な用例・説明を辞書でも確認します。
・Oxford English Dictionary: A physical condition resulting from being outside in severe weather conditions without adequate protection: ‘he died of exposure at 8,000 feet’
・Macmillan Dictionary: the harmful effect of very cold weather on your body: Two of the climbers died of exposure.
・Vocabulary.com: If you place someone or something in an environment that causes them to experience something, you can call this exposure. Exposure to sun and rain will cause wood to turn gray. In school, you will be given exposure to the basic principles of math, science and language.
The exposure of film to light results in a photograph. Sometimes, exposure is used without explicitly saying what something or someone was exposed to. It is simply implied. When a celebrity is given lots of exposure, it is well-known that the media is involved. If you die of exposure, it's understood that the harsh elements of the weather was meant. And if your house has a southern exposure, you know that this is the side where the sun shines.

hole-in-the-wall

The Red Notebookの著者がよく泊まるパリのホテルの話の個所です。
Other than its convenient location--midway down a narrow street just off the Boulevard Saint-Germain--there is nothing even remotely interesting about this hotel. Its rates are modest, its rooms are cramped, and it is not mentioned in any guidebook. The people who run it are pleasant enough, but it is no more than a drab and inconspicuous hole-in-the-wall, and except for a couple of American writers who have the same French publisher I do, I have never met anyone who has stayed there.
実際に壁に穴が開いているとは思えませんが "hole-in-the-wall" でみすぼらしいホテルだと言う事は容易に想像できます。そのものずばりの分かり易い表現です。辞書の説明を一応見てみます。
・Merriam-Webster's Online Dictionary: a small place (such as a bar or restaurant) that is not fancy or expensive
・Vocabulary.com: a small unpretentious out-of-the-way place “his office was a hole-in-the-wall”
やはり壁に穴が開いているというのは誇張でしたね。
壁に穴が開いているのはレストランやホテルだけでは無い様です。
・Wiktionary: hole-in-the-wall (plural hole-in-the-walls or holes-in-the-wall):
1.a small or obscure place, especially such a restaurant
2.(colloquial, chiefly UK) an automated teller machine (ATM)
Although either plural can be used for both meanings, hole-in-the-walls tends to be most commonly used for the "obscure place" sense, and holes-in-the-wall is more frequently used to mean "automated teller machines".
ATMを "hole-in-the-wall" と言うのは英国人らしいユーモアですね。

Smart shoper

A man approaches a very beautiful woman in a large supermarket and says, "I've lost my wife in the aisles. Would you mind talking to me for a couple of minutes?"
"Why?" the woman replies.
"Because every time I speak to a pretty lady, my wife appears out of nowhere."

digital detox

Reader's Digest Feb, 2014 のSocial Vocabのコーナーに "digital detox" なる言葉が The Oxford English Dictionaryに最近加えられたと書かれていたので、早速OEDオンライン辞書で確認しました。
informal: A period of time during which a person refrains from using electronic devices such as smartphones or computers, regarded as an opportunity to reduce stress or focus on social interaction in the physical world: ‘break free of your devices and go on a digital detox’
他の辞書もついでに見てみると、いつもよく使っている次ぎのオンライン辞書にも載っていました。
・Macmillan Dictionary: taking a break from the use of electronic devices such as computers, mobile phones, e-readers and MP3 players: But this is Digital Detox Week, when we are being asked to take a break from electronic entertainment to find out what we really enjoy.
・Dictionary.com: a period during which a person refrains from using digital or electronic devices, as to avoid distractions or make time for other activities: my week-long digital detox.
電車に乗っている時はもちろん、歩いている時、自転車に乗りながらもスマホを使っている人を多く見かける今日この頃です。　スマホ中毒の人には "digital detox" は確かに必要な気がします。

helter-skelter

The Red Notebookから著者が少年の頃に行ったハイキングの思い出の個所の引用です。
The lightning was what scared us, of course. It would have been stupid not to be scared, and in our panic we tried to run away from it. But the storm was too big, and everywhere we went we were met by more lightning. It was a helter-skelter stampede, a headlong rush in circles.
"helter-skelter" は初めて見る表現ですが、その後に "stampede" があるので、雷が怖いので慌てて逃げ出している様子を示していると想像できます。辞書で "helter-skelter" を確認します。
・Oxford English Dictionary: In disorderly haste or confusion: ‘hurtling helter-skelter down the pavement’
・Collins Dictionary: haphazard or carelessly hurried: Enormous sandstone rocks were piled up, helter-skelter, to the height of a big hill.
・Cambridge Advanced Learner's English Dictionary: quickly and in all directions: People were screaming and running helter-skelter down the steps to escape the flames.
・Cambridge Idioms Dictionary: if you do something helter-skelter, you do it very quickly and without organization We all ran helter-skelter down the stairs as soon as the alarm sounded.
"helter-skelter" は慌てずに文脈を考えると意味が分かる表現です。

marginalize

The Red Notebookに書かれているのは実話だと何度も著者が強調するので、話しの内容が嘘だとは思いませんが、かなり誇張があるように私には感じられます。著者のフランス人の友人で詩人のＣ氏の話からの文を引用します。
No one is more universally admired than C., no one has more talent, no one so readily commands the center of operation, and yet he has always done everything in his power to marginalize himself.
上の文に出てきた "marginalize" ですが、"margin" の意味から推測しようとしたのですが、諦めて辞書を見ます。
・Oxford English Dictionary: Treat (a person, group, or concept) as insignificant or peripheral: 'attempting to marginalize those who disagree’: (as adjective marginalized) ‘members of marginalized cultural groups’
・Collins Dictionary: (transitive) to relegate to the fringes, out of the mainstream; make seem unimportant ⇒ various economic assumptions marginalize women
そうか、中心ではなく端に置くのでこう言う意味になるのですね。例によって Vocabulary.comを見ると次ぎの様な詳しい説明がありました。
　 When you push people to the edge of society by not allowing them a place within it, you marginalize them. For example, some companies marginalize disabled people by refusing to hire them.
A society that labels certain people as outside the norm - weird, scary, hateful, or useless - marginalizes those people, edging them out. Native or aboriginal groups often end up in this position, and so do people who are poor, disabled, elderly, or who in other ways are seen as not quite fitting in. The Latin root is margo, "edge, brink, or border." Since the late 1920's marginalize has referred not to a literal edge, but to a powerless position just outside society.
日本語の窓際族も同じ発想から出た言葉ですね。

scrounge

副題がTrue Storiesとなっている "The Red Notebook" Paul Auster著を読み始めました。どんな内容かなのか今はさっぱり見当がつきません。
見覚えがあるのですが意味が直ぐに浮かんでこない単語が出てきました。
I remember savage nicotine fits, my body numb with need as I scrounged among sofa cushions and crawled behind cupboards in search of loose coins.
"scrounge" を辞書で調べます。
・Oxford English Dictionary: Seek to obtain (something, typically food or money) at the expense or through the generosity of others or by stealth: ‘he had managed to scrounge a free meal’
・Collins Dictionary:
1.when intr, sometimes foll by around to search in order to acquire (something) without cost: Gray managed to scrounge enough money for a plane ticket and a taxi to the venue and he made it just in time.
2.to obtain or seek to obtain (something) by cadging or begging
そう言えば、前に、何か食べ物を探すのに "scrounge" が使われていたことを思い出しました。

sycophantic

映画で元南アの大統領マンデラ氏の役を演じた俳優の記事（Reader's Digest 3月号）から引用します。
British actor Idris Elba prefers the direct approach. He blusters into his Soho hotel suite wearing jeans and a beanie and, despensing with the pleasantries, says, "Do you like this film? Do you hate this film? Is it sycophantic? When you walk away, do you get the sense that you learned anything about Mandela?"
上に出てきた "sycophantic" の個所は "psycho/psych" と発音は似ているようですが、意味も関係あるのでしょうか？
・Collins Dictionary: using flattery to win favour from individuals wielding influence; toadyish; obsequious: Coming from him this statement seemed considered and sincere rather than sycophantic
. ・Oxford English Dictionary: Behaving or done in an obsequious way in order to gain advantage: ‘a sycophantic interview’
・Vocabulary.com: The adjective sycophantic is perfect for describing someone who uses flattery to get what they want. The sycophantic guy in your biology class might compliment the professor on her fabulous shoes as he hands in his lab report.
Someone who's sycophantic goes overboard with compliments, usually to gain some kind of advantage. You see sycophantic behavior in Hollywood all the time, from red carpet interviews pouring flattery on movie stars to fawning autograph seekers. Sycophantic comes from the Greek word sykophantes, "one who shows the fig," a vulgar gesture of the time. The reference is to hypocritical Greeks behind the scenes who pretended to flatter while encouraging others to "show the fig."
"psycho/psych" とは関係ありませんでした。

locus of control

図書館から借りる本が途切れた時に読む "Understanding Psychology" に覚えておきたい表現がありました。
People with positive attributional styles, who see themselves as able to control events by hard work and effort, and who don't give up, tend to experience stress very differently. They are much less likely to become depressed, and much more likely to be able actually to do something about their situation, because they keep looking for ways to change it. These people have what is known as an internal locus of control. They believe that what happens to them is largely controlled by their own efforts. People with a depressive attributional style have an external locus of control, believing that they cannot influence what happens to them.
"locus" は単に中心と解しても意味が通じますが、"internal locus of control" と "external locus of control" は心理学用語となっているようです。　とりあえず、"locus" 単独の意味を確認します。
・Merriam-Webster's Online Dictionary: a center of activity, attention, or concentration: in democracy the locus of power is in the people
・Cambridge English Dictionary: the place where something happens or the central area of interest in something being discussed:
"locus of control" についてはWikipediaに詳しい説明があります。Wikipediaから冒頭の個所のみ引用します。
: In personality psychology, locus of control refers to the extent to which individuals believe that they can control events that affect them. Understanding of the concept was developed by Julian B. Rotter in 1954, and has since become an aspect of personality studies. A person's "locus" (Latin for "place" or "location") is conceptualized as either internal (the person believes they can control their life) or external (meaning they believe that their decisions and life are controlled by environmental factors which they cannot influence, or by chance or fate)
...
Individuals with a high internal locus of control believe that events in their life derive primarily from their own actions: for example, when receiving test results, people with an internal locus of control would tend to praise or blame themselves and their abilities, whereas people with an external locus of control would tend to praise or blame an external factor such as the teacher or the test.
確かにほとんどの事は "locus of control" で対処できる気がしていますが、シリアや北朝鮮の多くの人達は自分達ではどうしようもない環境に住んでいるのではないでしょうか。 そんな人々はほとんど "external locus of control" の考え方にならざるを得ないでしょう。

white hair

今日は母の日なので、世の母に贈るジョークです。
　One day, a little girl was sitting and watching her mother do the dishes at the kitchen sink.
　She suddenly noticed that her mother had several strands of white hair sticking out in contrast to her dark hair.

　The little girl looked at her mother and inquisitively asked, "Why are some of your hairs white, Mom?"

　Her mother replied, "Well, every time you do something wrong and make me cry or unhappy, one of my hairs turns white."

　The little girl thought about this explanation for a while and then asked, "Mommy, then why are ALL of grandma's hairs are white?"
子育て大変だと思いますが、余り子供をしかり過ぎずにがんぱって下さい。
私はゴールデンウィークの始まりからさぼっていた英語の勉強を明日から再開します。