vagary

But the senators say a vagary in the way the law is written means they can seek another term, Oregon Public Broadcasting reported.

From Seattle Times ● Aug. 26, 2023

An interesting, sciencey explanation of the Y chromosome and sex distinction in all it’s vagary and confusion, and the strange trip through the behaviors of the life span of the males of many species.

From New York Times ● Dec. 19, 2019

It covers the whole wide world of early-19th-century trade, and it evinces a worldly acceptance of human disparity and vagary.

From Washington Post ● Nov. 16, 2018

Normally, this would result in a total solar eclipse, but for a vagary of orbital mechanics: It happened when the Moon was near apogee, the point in its orbit when it’s farthest from Earth.

From Slate ● Dec. 23, 2013

As Sullivan saw it, “Burnham came out of his somnambulistic vagary and joined in. He was keen enough to understand that ‘Uncle Dick’”—meaning Hunt—“had done him a needed favor.”

From "The Devil in the White City" by Erik Larson

First, practice distinguishing between what the Constitution says and what judges and justices say about the Constitution, a document riddled with aspirational vagaries and flexible abstractions.

From Slate ● Jul. 20, 2026

“By the time the Scramble for Africa was over,” Martin Meredith tells us, the vagaries of geopolitical geometry had amalgamated “some 10,000 African polities . . . into forty European colonies and protectorates.”

From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 17, 2026

The vagaries of the schedule are something that figures to hamper MLS teams all season.

From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 18, 2026

A once proud, close-knit community has been left to the vagaries of absentee landlords, rising deprivation and residents who often don't want to be here.

From BBC ● Feb. 17, 2026

Even granted the vagaries of spelling in the seventeenth century, why should Newton choose to emphasize this word?

From "The Scientists" by John Gribbin