The scary truth about “Would They Love A Lion?”
I am seldom stirred by stories, be they children’s, Essop’s or fireside tales. But yesterday I was more than a little disturbed while reading a book with the title, “Would…
What’s in a name? Inventors credit their work
From brushes to magnets and this is where we find Madame Magnolia Attraction. Magnolia became enamoured with magnets and their captivating forces. Her groundbreaking research paved the way for countless applications, from MRI machines to magnetic levitation trains.
wine in a cellar (Photo by Quang Nguyen Vinh: Pexels)
Foment and ferment are not the same: word usage
Foment means "to incite or rouse." The words have some overlap in use, as they can both be used to express agitation and situations that can cause change or unrest.’
If music be the food of love
Gotta love Shakespeare: origin of idioms
An idiom as colour to language. If music be the food of love was coined by Shakespeare in Twelfth Night. Here we discuss usage
Zeitgeist: origin of words
“The general moral, intellectual, and cultural climate of an era; For example, the Zeitgeist of England in the Victorian period included a belief in industrial progress, and the Zeitgeist of the 1980s in the United States was a belief in the power of money and the many ways in which to spend it.”
Stop pretending things are okay
Papering over the potholes: idioms
I smile as I take my morning walk through Parkmore. The smile is an ironic one. The road workers are very busy painting the street markings and the L-outline at…
Pic by Johan Pettrich, unsplash
Can you count to 10? – idiom
Can you count to 10? Good then you can help with the untelling of the decuplets saga. In the Financial Mail today, a staff writer says Iqual Survé, the owner of the newspaper, that shared the story, would reveal all.
Let them eat cake
Let them eat cake: How idioms originate
With Women's Month well under way, gender equality is still a hot topic. At a gender equality webinar last week, one of the speakers who was trying to break through…
A stonking good word
Every now and then, a word comes a long that makes me prick up my ears and say, 'that's a good one'. Stonking is such a word. There’s so much…
Imagine money on the laundry line
A new take on money laundering
Last week while editing an academic text, my hawkish eyes fell upon the phrase money laundry. The esteemed professor had made a typographical error. I smiled quietly to myself as…