Proof readers were never fool-proof but editors now rely on blind electronics to check their texts.
So just yesterday I was treated to a corpse ‘lying prostate’. Well, it is in the dictionary. While the DT today advises that ‘the border force will compromise of…..’ thereby conflating two errors of syntax – one of which is getting ever more frequent, ‘comprise OF’ for ‘comprise’.
Do you get hot under the collar too?
There’s enough hatred and irrational behaviour over there to make it possible.
Hillary is a shoo-in for the Democratic nomination but the Bewigged Bigot could well buy his way to the show-down. Then what?
I’m afraid that if contemporary events conspire with his paranoia, he’ll lead the Americans to war with Islam.
A crazy thought? Persuade me it is.
No, seriously, it was a crisis! Suddenly our (cough) pipes of pan were blocked. In fact nothing would leave the bathroom at all. So I said to Mrs J, who was a girl guide before the Flood, ‘Doesn’t Arkela do it in the woods?’ If looks could kill.
Within a desperately long five hours (y’know how it is – when yer gotta go….), Monsewer Rasmussen drove up in his ‘normous tanker. In a trice he exposed our person-holes (very pc ‘ere, innit?), thrust his long black tube therein and sucked fit to bust, pointing out that we have a diameter problem; which was nothing we could fix without rebuilding the house. Apparently size is everything in his business. He could even smile, seeming happy with his lot.
So it all panned out well. I suppose we could have called the cops, but they’d have had nothing to go on.
That says it all about the Jihadi invasion of the West. If you’d like to ponder on a few more of his bons mots, here they are:
Fifty years ago we all admired the new Forth road bridge – a modern, elegant addition to a proud Scotland.
Today it’s out of service until the new year, owing to structural failures. So commiserations to Embra drivers, thousands of whom will have to find a new route to work, or take the train or a temporary ferry.
Come on, Nicola! Get it sorted!
Drought is a root cause of the Syrian war. It is an absolute truth uttered by our future King. As Thucydides, one of the early Greek chroniclers knew, causes have to be categorised. Some are climatic, others cultural, others political. So it would be helpful if responsible commentators could discuss the matter with HRH. But that’s easier said than done, given the 15-page contract broadcasters are required to sign before any interview.
Backside says, there’s no clever dick like a royal clever dick. Absolutely.
(The Indy and the Grauniad both cover this shamelessly republican tale.)
This is the deal: complete a couplet which begins
‘Yuletide comes but once a year…..’
e.g
‘I’m going to sleep until New Year.’
So do your worst, cherished versifiers!
Clive James is a wordsmith of the first order. For example:
http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2015/nov/21/clive-james-poets-sitwell-auden-gerbils
And he strikes a familiar chord for me, fascinated as I am by the spoken and written word, its etymology, philology and sheer existence in this otherwise technological world.
Boadicea's Chariot 
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