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Skim vs Shim - What's the difference?

skim | shim |

As verbs the difference between skim and shim

is that skim is to pass lightly; to glide along in an even, smooth course; to glide along near the surface while shim is to fit one or more shims to a piece of machinery.

As an adjective skim

is having lowered fat content.

As a noun shim is

a wedge.

skim

English

Verb

(skimm)
  • To pass lightly; to glide along in an even, smooth course; to glide along near the surface.
  • * Alexander Pope
    • Not so when swift Camilla scours the plain, / Flies o'er the unbending corn, and skims along the main.
  • To pass near the surface of; to brush the surface of; to glide swiftly along the surface of.
  • * Hazlitt
    • Homer describes Mercury as flinging himself from the top of Olympus, and skimming the surface of the ocean.
  • To hasten along with superficial attention.
  • * I. Watts
    • They skim over a science in a very superficial survey.
  • To put on a finishing coat of plaster.
  • to throw an object so it bounces on water (skimming stones )
  • to ricochet
  • to read quickly, skipping some detail
    • I skimmed the newspaper over breakfast.
  • to scrape off; to remove (something) from a surface
  • to clear (a liquid) from scum or substance floating or lying on it, by means of a utensil that passes just beneath the surface.
    • to skim''' milk; to '''skim broth
  • to clear a liquid from (scum or substance floating or lying on it), especially the cream that floats on top of fresh milk
    • to skim cream

    Derived terms

    * skim through * skim over * skim off * skimmed milk * skimmer * semi-skimmed

    Adjective

    (-)
  • (of milk) Having lowered fat content.

    • Derived terms

    * skim milk

    shim

    English

    Etymology 1

    Originally a piece of iron attached to a plow; sense of “thin piece of wood” from 1723, sense of “thin piece of material used for alignment or support” from 1860.

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • A wedge.
  • A thin piece of material, sometimes tapered, used for alignment or support.
  • (computing) A small library that transparently intercepts and modifies calls to an API, usually for compatibility purposes.
  • A kind of shallow plow used in tillage to break the ground and clear it of weeds.
  • A small metal device used to pick open a lock.

    • Verb

  • To fit one or more shims to a piece of machinery
  • To adjust something by using shims

    • Etymology 2

    .

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • (informal, often, derogatory) a person characterised by both male and female traits, or by ambiguous male-female traits, also called a he-she; transsexual.
  • * 1998 , Hobart Student Association, The Seneca review:
    • He — or "Shim " (she/him), as film director John Waters called the actor Divine — was as much a paradoxical as a perverse fellow.
  • * 1995 , The Advocate - May 30, 1995 - Page 11:
    • "We call him shim — short for 'she-him.'
  • (informal, often, derogatory) hermaphrodite.

    • References

    Anagrams

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