Speaking of interesting Latinate words, I love the word extraordinary. What’s great about it is that when you take it apart it just means “outside ordinary”—from the Latin extra ordinem, if you believe what www.etymonline.com says. I enjoy the idea that the word has gone from meaning “outside the routine” to “amazing.” Just stepping outside of day-to-day habits makes life “extraordinary.”

I noticed this today. All day I kept doing unusual things, from driving in the left lane on the way to work instead of the right lane and listening to classical radio instead of an audiobook or silence to wearing a hat for no particular reason when I went outside. Now, at the end of the day, I feel startlingly happy. Maybe all the extraordinariness startled my brain into being more cheerful.