The word lograr is most often used to mean to succeed, achieve or accomplish. Sometimes I will hear it to mean to obtain or to get. If someone is reaching out to get something and does, the verb lograr could be used. The idea is not just grabbing on to something, agarrar, but that it […]

To hinder or impede something is the word estorbar. But it carries with it the idea of getting in the way. More as a happenstance than as a malicious act of will. Like, to bother, or be a nuisance. A deliberate act would be detener or impedir. Detener meaning, to put a stop to or […]

The English word complacent means to be satisfied. Normally it is used to mean self-satisfaction. While technically accurate, I was a bit surprised by that definition. It often carries a negative connotation and I always thought of it as having the idea of lazy without a desire to improve the situation. According to every dictionary […]

I ran across this interesting word a week or so back. Menguar means to diminish, to lessen or to wane. It can be used to refer to something that was substantial but is now a mere shadow of itself.

To precipitate a problem, or solution, is to bring it to the forefront, or to make it stand out. The word comes from the idea of to throw or hurl ahead. In Spanish, that is exactly what the word means, to throw or hurl with the idea of haste. I have not heard this word […]

Last night I was teaching a math class and ran across the word almacenar. I suggested to another teacher that it was the two words alma and cenar, which would be to eat souls for supper. She did not agree with me on that. It means to store, as in to store food in the […]

Huelga is the noun for the word strike, as in a hunger strike or a strike from work. There is not much to say about the noun other than to know its definition. It is used the same way we would use the word strike in English. What is interesting though is the verb holgar. […]