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Monday August 10, 2009

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torrid [TOR-uhd]

adjective

1. Violently hot; drying or scorching with heat; burning; parching.
2. Parched; dried with heat; as, a torrid plain or desert.
3. Emotionally charged and vigorously energetic.

• Charlie needs more to do with his time. She needs inspiration for the best-selling novel she hopes to write. So Charlie and, unbeknownst to Jenna, Laura will carry on a torrid Internet romance with Jenna so that Laura can exact creative inspiration.
  Carol Memmott, "Jane Hamilton crafts a funny 'Masterpiece'", USA TODAY, Apr 28, 2009
• After a torrid start, Carlos Delgado has just three hits in his past 26 at-bats the past seven games after a 0-for-3 outing yesterday.
  Bart Hubbuch, "Wright Has Glove-ly Day", New York Post, Apr 26, 2009
• Katharina herself proposed to Martina to make them acquainted; but nothing would have induced Dame Martina to go out of her rooms, protected to the utmost from the torrid sunshine, so she left it to Heliodora to pay the visit and give her a report of the hero's daughter.
  Georg Ebers (1837 - 1898) A German Egyptologist and novelist. The Bride of the Nile, Vol 9, (1886)

Origin of the Word

Torrid, approximately 1586, derives from Latin torrida zona, from torrere "to parch".