Otiose is a word one comes across in Victorian novels and never really understands...
...or perhaps that's just me.
Anyway, I've looked it up, now, and otiose has two basic meanings: the commoner one is serving no useful purpose (this is usually to do with people speaking at great length without actually saying very much), but the word can also be used to mean lazy in a disinclined-to-do-anything kind of a way.
As a writer for children, and especially as a writer for people learning to read, I tend to construct my books on a value-per-word basis, but some degree of otiosity is essential to twenty-four hours news channels. It's all too often alive and thriving in Zoom meetings, too.
You know something? I could probably make a fortune with a Zoom-type system which cuts out after sixty minutes.
And an even greater one if it was half an hour.
Thing Not To Be Today: otiose. This word comes from the Latin ōtium, which means leisure.
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