If someone is cranky, they’re ill-tempered or in a bad mood. You might feel cranky, for instance, if you don’t get enough sleep (we relate!). The synonym ornery is even more unpleasant. This adjective emphasizes irritability that borders on meanness. Someone who is described as ornery is highly disagreeable and maybe more than a little stubborn. While both terms can describe temporary states of grouchiness, ornery is more likely to be used of a person (or animal) that is prickly, uncooperative, and cantankerous no matter how much sleep they got.

To examine something is to inspect or scrutinize it carefully. If you examine a piece of fruit before buying it, you’re giving it a thorough inspection. As a synonym for examine, peruse means “to survey or examine in detail” or sometimes “to read through with thoroughness or care.” A legally binding document is something you’d want to peruse, or read thoroughly, before signing. Attorneys in a trial will peruse, or examine in detail, evidence. But there’s a confounding twist: peruse is also used to mean “to scan or browse,” a breezy use that contradicts the careful attention to detail implied by its other meanings. Isn't English grand? All meanings are widely used and understood, but some style guides urge against the use of peruse as "to skim."

The verbs under discussion today come in handy when you want to say something without actually saying it—if you catch the drift. First, we’ll look at suggest: to suggest something is to bring it before a person’s mind without plain expression: I didn’t tell him to leave, I only suggested it! The synonym insinuate works on a less perceptible level. To insinuate something is to hint at it slyly or to instill or infuse it subtly or artfully, as into the mind. Insinuate connotes a degree of sneakiness or cunning that suggest does not, and it is especially used of ideas or accusations that one would not dare to say directly.