(v. t.) To miss intentionally; to avoid; to shun; to refuse; to let go by; to shirk.
(v. i.) A ridge of land left unplowed between furrows, or at the end of a field; a piece missed by the plow slipping aside.
(v. i.) A great beam, rafter, or timber; esp., the tie-beam of a house. The loft above was called "the balks."
(v. i.) One of the beams connecting the successive supports of a trestle bridge or bateau bridge.
(v. i.) A hindrance or disappointment; a check.
(v. i.) A sudden and obstinate stop; a failure.
(v. i.) A deceptive gesture of the pitcher, as if to deliver the ball.
(v. t.) To leave or make balks in.
(v. t.) To leave heaped up; to heap up in piles.
(v. t.) To disappoint; to frustrate; to foil; to baffle; to /hwart; as, to balk expectation.
(v. i.) To engage in contradiction; to be in opposition.
(v. i.) To stop abruptly and stand still obstinately; to jib; to stop short; to swerve; as, the horse balks.
(v. i.) To indicate to fishermen, by shouts or signals from shore, the direction taken by the shoals of herring.
Example Sentences:
(1) Since the first is balked by the obstacle of deficit reduction, emphasis has turned to the second.
(2) The US and its allies are balking at Iranian demands for all UN sanctions to be lifted at the start of a deal.
(3) The eastern European nations balked at the “emergency brake” on benefits to EU migrants.
(4) Critics balk at the original asking price of $399, but the initial stock sells out in five hours.
(5) In recent years, though, a number of his near comtemporaries – notably Leonard Cohen and Bruce Springsteen – have been revitalised by taking on the kind of touring schedules that many a younger artist might balk at.
(6) To attract support from moderate Republicans who balked at the plan, an additional $8bn was included over five years to fund so-called high-risk pools that would help subsidize people with preexisting conditions.. Health policy experts have argued the fix is insufficient.
(7) One government source said: "Patrick McLoughlin is not balking at these ideas, which are interesting.
(8) Her work, which tackles the problems women face in Egypt and across the world, has always attracted outrage, but she never seems to have balked at this; she has continued to address controversial issues such as prostitution, domestic violence and religious fundamentalism in her writing.
(9) Young parents who have seen their tax credits cut and wages stagnate might balk at George Osborne’s repeated claims that “the economic plan is working”.
(10) Duration of treadmill exercise on a Balke treadmill protocol increased similarly in the two groups, 62% in the older group (from 8.9 to 14.3 minutes) and 40% in the younger group (from 12.2 to 17.1 minutes) (p = NS).
(11) The Wigan Athletic chairman, Dave Whelan , could step in to save jobs at his stricken former company JJB Sports, which is searching for a buyer after shareholders balked at pumping more cash into the troubled chain.
(12) Republicans in the house have already balked at the $50bn in immediate relief for Sandy that went to the house on Tuesday.
(13) It has been known for weeks that the US balked at Germany’s demand for a no-spy agreement, in part because of the precedent it would set for other countries that might also ask not to be spied on, and in part because Germany , which has limited spy capabilities, had nothing to offer in trade.
(14) Distribution of mitoses and dead hepatocytes in the hepatic balk was investigated.
(15) The new service unveiled on Friday will allow viewers who balk at a monthly Sky pay-TV subscription to access on-demand content including the BBC iPlayer, Facebook and Sky News.
(16) I think we balk at commercialising babies for the same reason that there's no provision under law for financial compensation if you lose a loved one.
(17) The misery of the left was, in the 1980s, matched by the triumphalism of the free marketeers, who had transformed Britain beyond many of their wildest ambitions, and began to balk at the restraints put on their dreams by the European project.
(18) Any Moldy Peach diehards balking at the idea of Green duetting with someone other than Dawson are missing out, though: this record sounds as though he and Shapiro have known each other for ever.
(19) Many countries, including major ones, won’t be willing to make their mitigation commitment legally binding at the international level, and once some balk, the premise of a legal form applicable to all unravels,” he said.
(20) Balking as never before at being the EU's cashpoint, Germany has been the main obstacle, although others have also hidden behind Berlin and quietly egged it on.
Rafter
Definition:
(n.) A raftsman.
(n.) Originally, any rough and somewhat heavy piece of timber. Now, commonly, one of the timbers of a roof which are put on sloping, according to the inclination of the roof. See Illust. of Queen-post.
(v. t.) To make into rafters, as timber.
(v. t.) To furnish with rafters, as a house.
(v. t.) To plow so as to turn the grass side of each furrow upon an unplowed ridge; to ridge.
Example Sentences:
(1) In the News Corp report , Rafter said the rift with Tomic remained deep and possibly irreconcilable after his dumping from Australia’s Davis Cup team over his Wimbledon post-match outburst.
(2) One identified a blonde woman, smiling as she sold peanuts in paper cones to the rafters, as her sister – alive and well in Cuba, she said.
(3) Especially against Nick Kyrgios Read more Nick Kyrgios has come out in defence of Bernard Tomic , accusing Pat Rafter of being negative after the Tennis Australia performance director had responded to Tomic’s spray following his third-round Wimbledon exit.
(4) Back to the big leather punchbag hanging from the rafters, and Inna admits that the training sessions will not be entirely pacifist.
(5) Christian Radnedge , a Spurs-supporting journalist who was in the Smoking Dog, told the BBC that it had been "full to the rafters" when there was "a huge cacophony of noise and the sound of glass being smashed".
(6) Depending on the water level, which varies with rainfall and snowmelt, the Green is popular with rafters and kayakers when high and with canoeists and tubers when low.
(7) Like the majority of his employees – most of whom have now begun trickling back to work – Romualdez was almost washed away by the super storm and only survived by clutching onto roof rafters as the waters rose around him.
(8) Two others, photographed in a truck, helped the rafters but didn’t join them.
(9) It is proposed that continuous low-dose exposure to aerosolized, biologically active rafter dust could contribute to the respiratory insult of grain workers.
(10) But those crows also gather on the blackened rafters of British-era bungalows, while tanks and artillery pieces on which the wealth of a poor nation was squandered for decades sit rusting on hilltops.
(11) "Africans who refused to take the Mau Mau oath have had ropes tied around their necks and been strung up from rafters until unconscious.
(12) Nick Kyrgios bounces racket into crowd during tantrum at Wimbledon Read more The 22-year-old demanded an investigation into TA’s conduct after Rafter used Tomic’s father and coach John’s “intolerable” behaviour as the chief reason for no longer funding the family.
(13) Maní is more rustic and informal than DOM – simple furniture, whitewashed walls and a ceiling of dried branches laid over rafters – but the food is no less adventurous.
(14) On Friday, the red benches of the House of Lords , which sometimes serve as a quiet spot for a post-prandial nap, will be a hive of activity, packed to the gilded rafters with lords and ladies.
(15) Long-chain diglycerides (LCDGs) found in the human colon are mitogens selective for colon tumor cells, inducing mitogenesis in premalignant cells from each of 13 adenomas and in malignant cells from two of four carcinomas, but having no mitogenic effects on normal colonocytes (E. Friedman, P. Isaksson, J. Rafter, B. Marian, S. Winawer, and H. Newmark, Cancer Res., 49:544-548, 1989).
(16) Had the Elysée's salles des fêtes been packed to the ornate rafters and chandeliers with French media, the sleight of hand might have worked.
(17) Hitting back in sensational fashion after Pat Rafter vowed to stop the governing body’s funding to the Tomic family, including his younger sister Sara, Tomic described Australia’s director of performance as a “mask” for TA boss Craig Tiley.
(18) The painting, which measures 144cm x 175cm (56in x 69in) was found in April 2014, in the rafters of a house on the outskirts of Toulouse.
(19) Fungi did not grow in inside feed hoppers or in dust on rafters in the broiler houses.
(20) The lonely building on this remote Pacific island now contains only a punchbag that someone has strung from the classroom rafters, and a note scrawled on the chalkboard in Niuean: “Keep this place clean so it stays beautiful.” While much of the world worries about how it will accommodate rapidly growing populations, some islands in the Pacific face the opposite dilemma: how to stop everybody from leaving.