What is a perigee-syzygy?
The compound word describes what the vulgar press calls a supermoon
Mind Your Language
Monday
Thursday
Is it proper to ‘mull things?’
The history of the word is fearfully complicated and obscure
Thursday
When did brothers and sisters become ‘siblings’?
We never used to use the term in speech
Monday
The French have made a hash of the hashtag
The hash has grown in importance since 2007 when Twitter introduced the hashtag
Tuesday
The language of the victimhood war
To own occupies a semantic field which turns out to be a Grimpen Mire
Monday
The rational meaning of ‘surd’
A surd number or quantity is irrational, such as the square root of two
Thursday
The link between spick and span, spanking and spoon
Whatever spick and span reminds us of, it is as an idiom with a cheery meaning of its own
Monday
The language of lounging around
I was put in mind of lounging by video conferencing, which allows conferees to attend to their visible top half while wearing lounge pants below
Thursday
What’s the difference between ‘gifting’ and ‘giving’?
I started at the word gifting like a horse shying at a plastic bag caught in the hedge. Why didn’t I like it?
Wednesday
The hijacking of the Scots language
Scots has been used as a spoken and a literary language
