Ah, one thing I've loved ever since I took five semesters of German--the Germans have a word for everything!

So, I'm glancing through The Harvard Guide to Women's Health to see what it says about polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) for someone else who has it, and I come across two words I'd never heard of before, both Germanic in origin.

Mittelschmerz--"pain in the middle"--This is pain in the middle of the menstrual cycle, at ovulation. I used to have terrible mittelschmerz, often on both sides. Ha! I got to use it in a sentence. Nice to know there's a name for it--too bad I didn't know then.

Spinnbarkeit--This describes a quality of a woman's vaginal mucous during ovuluation. It becomes very clear and thin, but there's a lot of it--sort of like an egg white. In the words of the text "just before ovulation it can be stretched between two fingers into strands an inch or more long". Hmmm...I've never used that as a method for telling ovulation times, but apparently someone who speaks German figured it out. :)

Have I mentioned that even though the pay is low, I can't go to national meetings, and generally feel unrespected professionally at times, I love being a medical librarian?