Today's Word: Gound (Noun)

Pronunciation: ['gawnd]

Definition 1: The extraneous matter that collects in the corners of the eyes during sleep (often called "sleep" itself in the U.S.)

Usage 1: We cannot imagine how the English-speaking world has survived for three centuries without a word for this common natural substance. The word for it seems to have fallen into the crack between the 17th and 18th centuries. But now yourDictionary has brought it back again. Ta-da! We might as well resurrect the adjective, "goundy," too—and will the verb be far behind? "My eyes gounded up so remarkably over night I can barely see to dress this morning. Maybe I should stay in bed."

Suggested usage: If English has a word for everything, why do we use the same word, "sleep," for sleep and the substance left in the eyes by sleep? It would be a shame to lose this useful little workpony forever: "If you can't see that your shirt and pants do not match, you had better get the gound out of your eyes." Once we have reestablished it, we can manumit it to new heights of metaphoric glory: "I think Ermaline has an accumulation of gound on the brain not to see that school librarian is the perfect job for her."

Etymology: This word has been around forever, though probably not with this meaning. In Old English and Gothic it was "gund" but apparently is too peripheral to allure the etymologists.

(Today we thank—I think—Pierre-Louis Houle of Montreal for rescuing this little lexical chap from the dustbin of time.)

—Dr. Language, www.yourDictionary.com