Language
Vape
Last year, Oxford Languages’ word of the year was goblin mode. Apparently 300,000 voters decided upon it, but I haven’t…
Why ‘great’ should be used with great caution
Sir Keir Starmer told his party conference last month that a Labour government would within a year set up a…
What makes a ‘crisis’?
In his picture from 1932, ‘Derrière la gare Saint-Lazare’, Henri Cartier-Bresson caught the moment when a man in a hat…
Why ‘pop’ is popping up everywhere
The Guardian kindly tells us that green is a colour whose time has come: ‘A blazer or a cotton shirt…
What ‘Budget’ and ‘bilge’ have in common
The Budget (which the revolutionary fiscal act last week was technically not) is directly connected with bilge and with one…
The chronic misuse of ‘dire’
‘Dire?’ said my husband. ‘It’s something chronic.’ He was putting on his idea of an Estuary accent, in a manner…
The cereal ambiguity of ‘corn’
‘Wha, wha?’ said my husband in a slack-jawed way, throwing over a copy of the Guardian, as though it was…
The changing language of ‘mental health’
It is easy to laugh at young people asking for sympathy because ‘I’ve got mental health’. I think I heard…
Why everyone is ‘struggling’
‘Quicksand!’ yelled my husband, flailing his arms wildly. Since he was sitting in his armchair, his dramatic representation of a…
No, Boris Johnson isn’t ‘missing in action’
Someone in the Guardian wrote that Boris Johnson had his ‘out of office’ on, and the Chancellor was ‘missing in…
Will ‘hosepipe ban’ make it into the dictionary?
‘Got any ’ose?’ asked my husband, falling into his Two Ronnies ‘Four Candles’ routine, in which he likes to play…
