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looking for a wookiee
I think our family might acquire a new euphemism: “Looking for a wookiee.” It will mean ‘going to the toilet’! No, we haven’t lost our mind, and if you have ever visited our house you might have a sense of why “Looking for a wookiee” might mean that. Last year, when I was convalescing following…
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the write stuff
I have a confession to make. I love fountain pens. I don’t know why but I love the combination of the concept, the feel of them, and particularly the sense of the flow of ink when writing that make up a fountain pen. I even like the sense of ancient history behind them (there are…
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thoughtless or less thought?
A lot of time and effort had gone into creating a resource. It had been honed, refined, shaped and adapted over a period of several months after the initial version had been finished. Finally it was ready to be released and there some positive feedback. But there were also some people who made critical comments…
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no joking matter
Having recently posted my degree dissertation on ‘A Theology of Humour’ it feels appropriate to be making an observation on the recent comments by Boris Johnson about women wearing Burqas. I am not going to give Mr Johnson’s comments any publicity by repeating them save to say that I consider them to be reprehensible and…
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brexit stage right?
I have tried to resist the change, I have tried to make a stand, I have tried to persuade others, but in the end it seems inevitable that ‘Brexit’ has entered the English language. It’s such an ugly and clumsy word – a lazy amalgamation of ‘Britain’ and ‘exit’ to denote the decision in the…
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dis
In an early edition of yesterday’s bloggage I made a typo that completely changed the meaning of a phrase. I had edited what I had written from ‘I do not agree…’ to ‘I profoundly disagree…’ I replaced the ‘do not’ with ‘profoundly’ and thought that I had successfully added ‘dis’ to the front of ‘agree’…
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addidges
Some words start to sound funny when you say them out loud a few times. They may start off sounding fine, but when you repeat them they start to take on a different audio character. Try these (repeat them slowly out loud 4 or 5 times): Bliss Grumbling Indulge Adage I hope that you are…
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super script
On Sunday morning I was preaching (not unusual for me) and asked the question: “Why is it that noses run and feet smell?” It is a characteristic of language that words can have more than one meaning and in the case above it creates a punderful play on words when you juxtapose two such incidences.…
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expect the unexpected and other silly things we say
I was listening to the radio recently and the interviewer was asking his expert interviewee about the financial crisis in Greece. He asked the expert what surprises lay in store as the process unfolded. To be fair the expert was not fazed by such a daft question and pointed out that by their nature surprises…
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mind your language
Regular bloggists here will know that I love language, and I am fascinated by the way it evolves. I have even attempted to introduce new words and concepts into the English language (bloggist, bloggage, technoloiterate, for example) but so far to no avail. I wonder what it is about a new word that enables it…
nukelearfishing 