English is a confusing language. Simple words can have opposite meanings or different implications. It all depends on the context. Here’s some examples …
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Category: Language
What the FAQ?
There’s and old saying that the computing industry is confusing mass of TLAs (Three-Letter Acronyms) and ETLAs (Extended Three-Letter Acronyms[…]
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A Rough Guide to Rude Rhyming Slang
Over-excited Puddings and Other Odd Origins
Whether you’re miffed, waffling, ticket-boo or taking the Mickey, the English language is full of words with odd derivations. Just don’t pop your clogs before reading this…
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Four Candles
Cross-eyed bears and friendly ants
My late mother thought Gladly was rather a nice name for a bear, but as a child she could never[…]
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The 8 longest words in English
The longest word in the English language is a whisker under 190,000 letters long and would take over an hour[…]
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Using two words instead of one
Benjamin Dreyer has compiled a list of redundancies, surplus words to delete from your writing where you’ve used two words[…]
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12 Odd Idioms
Some years ago, a German friend – who speaks very good English – was visiting New Zealand and boarded a[…]
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The Nautical Derivation of Well-known Words and Phrases
Many familiar English words and phrases have interesting derivations, and because England was once a great sea power, a surprising[…]
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