Word: overtuned Part of Speech: adj Etymology: From over- + tuned. 1. Tuned or adjusted so as to be excessive (in terms of some quality), especially Example: The process is overtuned. . . . Now it's gotten to the point where it takes sixteen months to get out any release of any Microsoft product. They really can't steer that ship very fast. Example: "What are you talking about?" My voice was higher than usual, overtuned. I couldn't move. "What are you saying?" 2. Tuned or adjusted so as to be excessive (in terms of some quality), especially: Example: It was not until he was lying in the hospital bed at St Stephen's with his hand and arm fished like a broken spar that he realized his nerves were wound up tauter than an overtuned violin: another fraction of a turn, it seemed, and something would snap. Example: Patiently — as patiently as he could with nerves that felt like overtuned guitar-strings — Clay said, "There's nothing wrong with it, honey. I just want to get rolling. I don't think we're going to see anyone, anyway. I think it's too soon." 3. Tuned or adjusted so as to be excessive (in terms of some quality), especially: Example: There was the high-pitched rev of an overtuned engine, and Rosalie roared out of the shed and headed for the gully of the little stream by the dry-stone wall. Example: Then he heard the familiar revving of the overtuned engine and went to the center window. The Flamer was pulling up curbside on the street below Doug was downstairs and outside in a flash. 4. Tuned or adjusted so as to be excessive (in terms of some quality), especially: Example: Had she just caught a reflection from somewhere else? A night bird? Or were her overtuned and hypervigilant senses playing games with her mind? Example: Freud, according to a poster I once owned, reckoned that the average redblooded male thinks about sex every three minutes, but in Afghanistan I hardly thought about it at all. This realisation had only dawned on me when I left the country. My first contact with non-Muslims had been in the Uzbek capital of Tashkent, where, according to my overtuned antennae, the streets seemed weirdly crammed with blondes in miniskirts. 5. Tuned or adjusted so as to be excessive (in terms of some quality), especially: Example: I think honestly some of the abilities we gave Dash may have been slightly overtuned. Example: The Hearthstone developers wanted to capture that fantasy within the context of a head-to-head CCG, and the results were outstandingly overtuned. In the hours after Ashes of Outland dropped, Demon Hunter was the only class in the game with a positive win rate. 6. Tuned or adjusted so as to be excessive (in terms of some quality), especially: Example: For a while, there was a concern that nobody could beat Riven, that Last Wish was simply too overtuned for day-one raiders. But then the first crew beat the boss around power level 550, and it became clear that Bungie had done something amazing. Example: When Shadowlands launched back in November, the challenges of an initially overtuned Castle Nathria raid, seemingly endless Torghast runs, and the introduction of the Covenant system were enough to keep us all busy. 7. Excessive in some respect (without any implication of having been tuned). Labels: broadly, figuratively Example: There was a baby photo, those school portraits with the rainbow background, a big Afro playing basketball, a tuxedo-and-date prom, a couple of graduations, blah, blah, blah. Corny, yes, but these photo montages always touched Myron, exploiting his overtuned sensitivity like a sappy Hallmark commercial. Example: We also accept what we are told in the same breath, that he was certifiably insane. Because according to the received wisdom of popular culture, this is the inevitable consequence of having a precociously overtuned mind.