I was reading the blurb on the book I’ve just started reading, Breakfast of Champions by Kurt Vonnegut, when I got a little surprise.
Indiana
politics
The Writing’s on the Wall
The signs are there that something bad is going to happen. Its meaning isn’t hard to figure out, and there’s a logic to it (writing on a wall is a pretty visible sign). But where does this expression come from?
Remuneration
That’s right. Not renumeration: remuneration.
This is probably among the most-commonly misspelled words in English, and it’s easy to understand why.
Breaking News
This is one of those terms that’s become so common that its original (and, after some thought, fairly obvious) meaning has become a little lost to time.
AD/BC
You’re probably familiar with these abbreviations, used to indicate if a year took place either on or after AD 1, or before it. You probably also know that BC stands for Before Christ, as our current calendar system is based on the assumption that Jesus Christ was born in AD 1. What about AD though?
Why do we Say Côte d’Ivoire in English?
Looking at my statistics earlier, I saw that someone had visited this site today from Côte d’Ivoire (hi). Or, if you prefer, The Ivory Coast. Obviously Côte d’Ivoire is French, and The Ivory Coast is English, but you might have noticed that Côte d’Ivoire is often used in English as the name of the country, even though we usually translate names of countries into English. Why do we make an exception in the case of Côte d’Ivoire then?
Sautéd
Do you ever see pretentious French terms on menus and wish you knew what they meant without having to look up their meaning? Perhaps you choose a dish in a restaurant which includes sautéd greens, but you have no idea what they exactly are. Well, let me help you with this one at least. And talk about Ancient Greek philosophers and heraldry too, naturally.
English-Language Thoughts 