Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun The natural satellite of Earth, visible by reflection of sunlight and having a slightly elliptical orbit, approximately 356,000 kilometers (221,600 miles) distant at perigee and 406,997 kilometers (252,950 miles) at apogee. Its mean diameter is 3,475 kilometers (2,160 miles), its mass approximately one eightieth that of Earth, and its average period of revolution around Earth 29 days 12 hours 44 minutes calculated with respect to the sun.
  • noun A natural satellite revolving around a planet.
  • noun The moon as it appears at a particular time in its cycle of phases.
  • noun A month, especially a lunar month.
  • noun A disk, globe, or crescent resembling the natural satellite of Earth.
  • noun Moonlight.
  • noun Something unreasonable or unattainable.
  • noun Slang The bared buttocks.
  • intransitive verb To wander about or pass time languidly and aimlessly.
  • intransitive verb To yearn or pine as if infatuated.
  • intransitive verb Slang To expose one's buttocks in public as a prank or disrespectful gesture.
  • intransitive verb Slang To expose one's buttocks to (others) as a prank or disrespectful gesture.
  • idiom (over the moon) In a state of great happiness.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • To adorn with a moon or moons; furnish with crescents or moon-shaped marks.
  • To expose to the rays of the moon.
  • To wander or gaze idly or moodily about, as if moonstruck.
  • In opposum-hunting, to locate (the hiding-place of the animal) by bringing the tree in which it is supposed to lurk into clear view between one's self and the moon.
  • To shave (skins) with a moon or moon-knife. See mooning, 1.
  • noun An obsolete spelling of moan.
  • noun Moonlight.
  • noun A heavenly body which revolves around the earth monthly, accompanying the earth as a satellite in its annual revolution, and shining by the sun's reflected light.
  • noun A satellite of any planet: as, the moons of Jupiter; Uranian moons.
  • noun The period of a synodical revolution of the moon round the earth; a month.
  • noun Something in the shape of a moon, especially of a half-moon or crescent.
  • noun In brickmaking, an implement of the nature of a slicebar, for slicing or loosening fires in the grates of brickkilns. It is somewhat longer than half the width of the kiln, and has a nearly circular blade perforated in the middle, which is shoved in on the top of the grate and under the fire, to clear out ashes and brighten up the fire.
  • noun The golden-crested wren, Regulus cristatus. Also moonie, muin. See cut under goldcrest.
  • noun The moon-daisy or moon-flower. Also moons

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • transitive verb To expose to the rays of the moon.
  • transitive verb To expose one's naked buttocks to (a person); -- a vulgar sign of contempt or disrespect, sometimes done as a prank.
  • intransitive verb To act if moonstruck; to wander or gaze about in an abstracted manner.
  • noun The celestial orb which revolves round the earth; the satellite of the earth; a secondary planet, whose light, borrowed from the sun, is reflected to the earth, and serves to dispel the darkness of night. The diameter of the moon is 2,160 miles, its mean distance from the earth is 240,000 miles, and its mass is one eightieth that of the earth. See Lunar month, under month.
  • noun A secondary planet, or satellite, revolving about any member of the solar system.
  • noun The time occupied by the moon in making one revolution in her orbit; a month.
  • noun (Fort.) A crescentlike outwork. See Half-moon.
  • noun slang The deliberately exposed naked buttocks.
  • noun (Far.), (Med.) Hemeralopia.
  • noun a dial used to indicate time by moonlight.
  • noun a round face like a full moon.
  • noun [Poetic] lunacy.
  • noun a lunar month.
  • noun (Bot.) a shrubby species of medic (Medicago arborea). See Medic.
  • noun a lunar year, consisting of lunar months, being sometimes twelve and sometimes thirteen.
  • noun see blue moon in the vocabulary.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun The largest satellite of Earth.
  • noun Any natural satellite of a planet.
  • noun literary A month, particularly a lunar month.
  • verb transitive, colloquial To display one's buttocks to, typically as a jest, insult, or protest
  • verb intransitive, colloquial (usually followed by over or after) To fuss over something adoringly; to be infatuated with someone.

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English moone, from Old English mōna; see mē- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle English mone, from Old English mōna ("moon"), from Proto-Germanic *mēnô (“moon”), from Proto-Indo-European *mḗh₁n̥s (“moon, month”), from *mē-² (“to measure”). Cognate with Scots mone, mune ("moone"), North Frisian muun ("moon"), West Frisian moanne ("moon"), Dutch maan ("moon"), German Mond ("moon"), Swedish måne ("moon"), Icelandic máni ("moon"), Latin mēnsis ("month"). See also month, a related term within Indo-European.

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Examples

  • Moon Dreams - The Americans may still go to the moon before the Chinese, The Economist

    NASA Watch: Marc Boucher: February 2010 Archives 2010

  • I suggest you read an excellent book on James Web called THE MAN WHO RAN THE MOON by Piers Bizony to get some real insights into how NASA ran and how by 1963 JFK was ready to pull the plug on anything other than getting to the moon.

    Sources: Hillary To Be Endorsed By John Glenn 2009

  • There are some clips online for Duncan Jones' Moon starring Sam Rockwell, a film that follows an man assigned to a three year shift of a mining station on the moon, sending parcels of a rare material back to Earth which is helping to solve the Earth's energy crisis.

    Filmstalker: Moon clips online 2009

  • The Associated Press: 'Moon rock' in Dutch museum is just petrified wood: The Dutch national museum says one of its prized possessions, a rock supposedly brought back from the moon by U.S. astronauts, is just a piece of petrified wood.

    Petrified Wood on the Moon! Bill Crider 2009

  • There are some clips online for Duncan Jones' Moon starring Sam Rockwell, a film that follows an man assigned to a three year shift of a mining station on the moon, sending parcels of a rare material back to Earth which is helping to solve the Earth's energy crisis.

    Filmstalker: June 2009 Archives 2009

  • They finally devulged the Moon has water (scientists have known this since the 60's) and other scientists (John Lear) reveal the moon has 64% oxygen.

    2012 Movie Review 2009

  • NASA To Bomb The Moon (PHOTOS) * See photos below* NASA is launching a dramatic mission to bomb the moon.

    Amy Ephron: Help Save the Moon 2009

  • Moon Men yahooBuzzArticleHeadline = 'Moon Men'; yahooBuzzArticleSummary = 'Article: On July 20th when man first walked on the moon there was a surrealism felt worldwide, like something out of a science fiction movie as whole nations and their peoples surrounded TV sets and watched as Armstrong and Aldrin walked on the moon.

    Moon Men 2009

  • (Soundbite of song, "Moon and Moon") Ms. KHAN: (Singing) Calling moon and moon.

    Pop Songs Bred Of The Visual And Unusual 2009

  • The title "Ring Around the Moon," from the collection Enclosure Two: Historic Speech-Music Recordings, sounds like a ring around the moon.

    Phil Ramone and Danielle Evin: Dog Ears Music: Volume Forty-Five 2009

  • Asiatic black bears (also called moon bears) and sun bears face a more direct human threat.

    To save bears, we must learn to live alongside them Henry Nicholls 2023

Comments

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  • The moon is traveling about 2300 MPH in its orbit around the Earth. The Earth, spinning on its axis at about 1000 MPH, is traveling roughly 67,000 MPH around the sun, while the sun is zooming at 560,000 MPH around the hub of the Milky Way (the last time our sun was in it's present relative position on its galactic circuit, dinosaurs walked the earth!). And the Milky Way is going someanywhere even faster. Think about it: all that rushing around! And Sir Isaac, sitting under an apple tree was struck by an apple...so, where do you suppose IT was going? Well, it flew right into Sir Isaac's brain and became The Calculus, and our view of the cosmos has never been the same since.

    See galaxy for more.

    February 8, 2007

  • Just remember that you're standing on a planet that's evolving

    And revolving at nine hundred miles an hour,

    That's orbiting at nineteen miles a second, so it's reckoned,

    A sun that is the source of all our power.

    The sun and you and me and all the stars that we can see

    Are moving at a million miles a day

    In an outer spiral arm, at forty thousand miles an hour,

    Of the galaxy we call the 'Milky Way'.

    Our galaxy itself contains a hundred billion stars.

    It's a hundred thousand light years side to side.

    It bulges in the middle, sixteen thousand light years thick,

    But out by us, it's just three thousand light years wide.

    We're thirty thousand light years from galactic central point.

    We go 'round every two hundred million years,

    And our galaxy is only one of millions of billions

    In this amazing and expanding universe.

    The universe itself keeps on expanding and expanding

    In all of the directions it can whizz

    As fast as it can go, at the speed of light, you know,

    Twelve million miles a minute, and that's the fastest speed there is.

    So remember, when you're feeling very small and insecure,

    How amazingly unlikely is your birth,

    And pray that there's intelligent life somewhere up in space,

    'Cause there's bugger all down here on Earth.

    February 8, 2007

  • From a pot of wine among the flowers

    I drank alone. There was no one with me--

    Till, raising my cup, I asked the bright moon

    To bring me my shadow and make us three.

    Alas, the moon was unable to drink

    And my shadow tagged me vacantly;

    But still for a while I had these friends

    To cheer me throutg the end of spring...

    I sang. The moon encouraged me.

    I danced, my shadow tumbled after.

    As long as I know we were boon companions.

    And then I was drunk, and we lost one another.

    ...shall good will ever be secure?

    I watch the long River of Stars.

    --from the Chinese

    March 9, 2007

  • Here's a rule of thumb I made up for figuring out whether the moon's waxing or waning: "If the light's on the Right, it's arRiving. If the Light's on the Left, it's Leaving". You've got to be able to rotate the moon in your imagination (or tilt your head) slightly if the illuminated portion seems to be mostly on the bottom of the moon's disc.

    July 13, 2007

  • I have it on the dubious authority of forwarded email that February 1865 is the only month in recorded history not to have a full moon. Prolly maybe?

    October 5, 2007

  • Not true :(

    There was a full moon on 10 February 1865. February 1866 did not have a full moon. More recently, there was no full moon in February 1999. Link.

    October 5, 2007

  • Nice work kewpid! I figured someWordie would have the skills to deliver the unvarnished truth.

    October 5, 2007

  • Jane Smiley on the Apollo mission.

    February 1, 2008

  • "Sometimes the moon would gleam whitely above us and my brothers would say, 'Coimhead, lochran digh nam bochd,''Look, the lamp of the poor.' And sometimes at the appearance of the new moon Calum would bow or almost curtsey in the old way and repeat the verses taught to him by the old Calum Ruaidh men of the country:

    Glory forever to thee so bright

    Thou moon so white of this very night;

    Thouself forever thou dost endure

    As the glorious lantern of the poor."

    - 'No Great Mischief', Alistair MacLeod.

    February 19, 2008

  • Bilby, that is so beautiful. Thanks for sharing it.

    February 19, 2008

  • If it was a new atlas I suppose it would be 'new moon'.

    August 28, 2008

  • December 1, 2008. Look at the moon tonight, if you are able to. See here.

    December 1, 2008

  • Neat! Thanks, c_b. Now if only it would clear up....

    December 2, 2008

  • *baffled by my previous comment*

    December 2, 2008

  • The expression "to moon" = to expose one's buttocks as a prank or gesture of disrespect.

    This expression seems to be a euphemism based on the fact the Hebrew words for "moon" and "buttocks" are near homonyms. Using KH for the letter khaf and X for the letter khet:

    YeReKH yod-resh-khaf = buttock, haunch, thigh

    YaRa:aX yod-resh-het = moon

    June 18, 2009