I've just been watching Parky. Correct me if I'm wrong, but:
Mick Hucknall = Talentless, ruby-toothed ginner.
His name also happens to be an anagram of lick lank chum, but let's not go there.
Oversight
BBC: Pub industry faces blurred future
Dwindling visits to village locals coupled with a slowing of the High Street pub boom are taking their toll on the pub industry. "Use them or lose them," says the Campaign for Real Ale as it launches National Pubs Week…Top attractions at a pub:
- The people
- Quality Food
- Friendly staff
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p>Ahem, and what about the bloody beer?
BBC redesigns its news site
They've just ruined one of the best sites on the Internet. Never mind the content, feel the width. Disaster.
The Subjunctive
Challenge posed in an email from Stense:
…I spent yesterday musing about why I thought 'If I were you' was more grammatically correct than 'If I was you' - answers on a postcard please!
An excellent challenge! So I sent her a post card (printed in very small letters), which went as follows:
Stense,
You asked for answers on a post card for why you (correctly) thought 'If I were you' was more grammatically correct than 'If I was you'. The answer is that you are employing the subjunctive, i.e. you have changed the form of a verb when the content of the clause in which it is contained is being doubted, supposed, feared true, etc., rather than being asserted. It's the word 'if' that's the dead give-away... You are raising the hypothetical supposition that you could be me and choose to act differently to me. English isn't the only language that has a subjunctive (s/t)ense (ouch!). I learnt all about the subjunctive in my Latin lessons, and it's a very useful weapon to have in your arsenal. If we didn't have the subjunctive, how would we be able to tell whether 'if I was you' meant 'supposing I was in your position' or meant 'if I used to be you'? (Although, if you'll forgive a somewhat pedantic aside, the latter doesn't make much sense in a world where people do not swap personalities. Indeed, the fact that we do not swap personalities renders the phrase 'If I were you' completely preposterous - for I shall never be you, and, even if I did miraculously manage to become you (and could somehow resist the overwhelming temptation to take a hot, soapy shower before covering myself in baby oil), I would still do exactly the same as whatever you would do in that situation - because I would actually be you!)
But, having said all that, note how I failed to employ the subjunctive in the phrase 'If we didn't have the subjunctive, how would we be able to tell...' above. By rights, I should really have said 'how should we' and not 'how would we', for I was exploring the hypothetical situation in which the subjunctive did not exist. You see how tricky the subjunctive can get? Indeed, so tricky is it that I'm not entirely sure that it shouldn't have been 'how would we' all along.
Unfortunately for those like me who had the benefit of a classical education, and who tend to appreciate this sort of arcane mumbo-jumbo, the use of the subjunctive has gone into a steep decline in recent years - or, to put it another way (look out, Stense, here comes the pun:) the world seems to be suffering from a severe bout of subjunctivitis.
I hope that answers your question - although perhaps it would be simpler for me to email a reply next time.
Ape-shit
BBC (01-Jan-03): Ape 'learns to talk'
Near-Death Experience
I was carrying out some diagnostic work with an electrical meter yesterday, trying to work out why the light over my bed still wasn't working after I had re-connected a loose wire. I wasn't quite careful enough with my probe, and the room lit up for a brief instant.
As near-death experiences go, I'd give it 6 out of 10.
Premonition
I had a strange, whisky-induced dream last night: I was in a cow shed with a farmer friend of mine, and drank water from a rusty old ladel, realising it would give me a sore throat. When I woke up, I had a humdinger of a sore throat.
Less sceptical people than myself would say that I'd had a premonition; I say that I developed a sore throat during the night, which I then incorporated into my dream.
How do you manage to get a sore throat after drinking whisky?
Prediction Comes True: "Half-contrary gin"
Another prediction comes true. This is getting too easy:
Daily Telegraph: They can't mean us [02-Jan-03]
"It is sad that someone should make that statement; it is a bit divisive. I admit there is an element of the gin and Jag brigade, but they don't dominate. You've also got people living in council houses."
The UK government has accused villages surrounded Maidenhead of being populated by 'the gin and Jag brigade'. The locals (see quote above), while disagreeing with the tone of the government's slur, admit that there is an element of truth in it (i.e. they hold half-contrary views). (Half-contrary gin, geddit?)
Call me Mystic Rick!
Plus ça change
From The Victorians by A.N. Wilson, p. 179 (concerning the Crimean War):
[Times journalist, William Howard] Russell's dispatches had revealed a miserable, unheroic, ramshackle campaign presided over by old men. Lord Raglan, fluent in French as he was, and genial, had a distressing habit - born of his youthful years of serving under Wellington - of referring to the French as 'the enemy'.
Prediction Comes True: "Lift angry anchor"
I don't believe it. Another of my 'predictions' for the year has already come true:
TwinCities.com: WCCO Farewell Ends with Hard Feelings [03-Jan-03]
[V]eteran anchor Bill Carlson … read his last script as anchor of the [WCCO-TV] station's noon news.
That's veteran TV news anchorman, Bill Carlson, who has been lifted from his show after 37 years to make way for younger blood. His mood is described as politely terse, although the general atmosphere was clearly angry. (Lift angry anchor, geddit?)
That Farthing woman's in league with the devil, I tell you!