Discussion Groups / English Usage / March 2007

The NHS has allotted me a password in connection with a hospital visit.
It is "bicycle lily". I convulsed a receptionist by pointing out that it
sounded like one of those songs soldiers sing when there are no ladies
present.

Before I came here, I was confused about this project. Having listened to
your lecture I am still confused, but on a higher level.
Here "but" means except?Does it say that I only understand on a higher level
and I am still cofused.

Exhibit Group's manager explained to me that a sign is a physical
thing.  They make signs.  But the graphics (text and/or pictures)
that were on the sign were the signage.  They could not make a
sign until they had the signage in hand.  Thus: "We need the

What is "Dutch-processed cocoa powder", please? I've found a cake recipe
which needs three-quarters of a US cup of it to two cups of flour, so it
doesn't sound like the cocoa powder I'm used to. A typical recipe for me
would only have maybe an ounce or two of cocoa for half a pound ...

Yes, we Australians don't have to receive those calls!
"In response to increasing levels of community concern about
unsolicited telemarketing calls, ACMA is establishing the Do Not Call
Register. The Register will be launched no later than May 2007.

I'm sure I've been using 'peripatations' to mean a general
wandering about, for many a long year, so I'm somewhat surprised
to find that the word does not exist in any of the dictionaries
that I have consulted. Is it a word others use?

U.S. newsreaders always called Charles de Gaulle "Charlz," not "Sharl." They
gave his given name its American pronunciation.
But they almost always call Venezuelan firebrand Hugo Chavez "Oogo," instead
of the American "Hyoogo."

Somewhere near here in Florida, there's a huge condominium which
advertises on television. It's called Quayside, and in typical American
fashion, people who've never heard the word used properly decided to
pronounce it "KWAY-side".

Just a basic question: should I write "3D imaging", "3d-imaging", or
any other solution?
Thank you very much in advance,
LoB

This is related my "chicken" articles posted this date,
March 28, 2007, for future archival searches.
Should you wish to learn more about my discussion of
our mental automatic correction of misspellings and

I've been trying for a while now to find one word to describe a
certain feeling: it's very fuzzy, very romantic in the old sense, a
kind of mild happiness with a tinge of sadness. I might describe it as
melancholy, but not in its hardest meaning of deep depression. The

That's wot the outgoing Sheriff (Nickolas Grace) called the incoming
Sheriff (Lewis Collins) last night on ITV3 - he was furious! - so
would you have been, girls and boys! :-D

From a breaking news story, "EU officials interrogated after
anti-corruption raids", at <http://euobserver.com/9/23794?rss_rk=1>:
       Jos Colpin at the Brussels prosecutor's office told EUobserver
       the officials arrested on Tuesday are suspected of "passive

I'd like to hear your thoughts on the use of the word "literate" in the
following sentence:
   Roman religious practice was often based on literate actions and was
highly formulaic ...etc.

I went to five very different schools during my four-year high school
career, and in all of them, we used Wariner's series of books on English
grammar and composition.
Whatever happened to Wariner's, and more pertinently, the standards of