So you’ve long dreamed of writing fiction, but don’t know where to begin? There are lots of ways to get started — creative writing classes, local writing groups, and books with prompts to get you going. The key is to get started, and...
John from Orlando, Florida, shares a story about a trip to Capetown, South Africa, where he discovered that the phrase I’ll be with you now meant something more like “Wait a minute.” The expression now now, deriving from an...
The months of September, October, November, and December take their names from Latin words meaning “seven,” “eight,” “nine,” and “ten.” So why don’t their names correspond to where they fall in...
A surfer in Imperial Beach, California, wonders who coined the word gnarly to describe waves that are particularly challenging. This term may have originated in the slang of surfers in South Africa in the 1970s and eventually spread into everyday...
Hey, there! A happy post-election season to you. We hope our friends on the east coast are fully powered, dry, and warm. And everywhere else, we hope your recycling is overflowing with campaign signs. Here’s what we’ve been up to: brand...
tromboning n.— «A prime example is the historical monopolisation of the telecoms sector by Telkom. In order to deliver cheaper calls we have been forced to resort to a method called tromboning. Here, we actually re-route calls to...