To the Core

Another day, another Trump tweet, another nugget of stupidity. As if the Space Force Saturday-morning cartoon wasn’t enough, he then misspelled Marine Corps as Marine Core. At least though, it’s a somewhat understandable misspelling, the words sound the same, and in meaning the words corps and core are similar in a way.

Continue reading

Space Force!

No political commentary needed, I think: space force says it all, doesn’t it? (unless you’re reading this in the future, in which case this is what I’m talking about)

Continue reading

The Game’s Afoot

I had a really great idea today, at about 08.00am, while I was half asleep. I’ve no idea now what it was, just a vague sense that it was about some words with different meanings that have a shared etymology. Whatever it was, it was interesting (to me), but it’s gone now.

Continue reading

Cryptocurrency

You’ve probably heard this term a lot recently, referring to digital currencies such as Bitcoin. What does that prefix crypto- mean though?

Continue reading

Why is Peggy Short for Margaret?

What do these four women have in common?

Why, the fact that they all have the same name of course!

OK, they don’t really, but it’s not entirely inaccurate to say so. Why not? Read on…

Continue reading

Home

What makes a house a home?

I’m sure you all have very different and interesting answers to that question.

Continue reading

I’m no Expert

It’s true, I’m not.

No matter how much I might sound like I think I am, most of what I share here is from my own informal research. Of course working in an English-language school helps, as does my own interest in language, but I could never claim to be an expert in any kind of official sense. Though, if you look at where the word comes from, then maybe I am…

Continue reading