Tag: Reference

In a word: Rain

Well, isn’t it just like you to rain on my parade?

Yes, and don’t we need a lot of rain because of the bushfires that are burning out of control?

Rain is that stuff that falls from the sky, sometimes at the awkwardest of times, like when you leave your umbrella in the car.

And rain can be a problem in sub-zero temperatures and high winds when it almost takes on the form of multiple miniature knives.  Rain and snow together, sleep, but that’s something else.

Of course, it could always rain cats and dogs, a rather interesting occurrence if it ever happened.

This should not be confused with the word rein.

As any horseperson would know this is what helps control a horse

But, it doesn’t have to be a horse, it might be that you are told to rein in your attack dog

Or rein in your excesses

Or alternatively, give a person free rein to go about their business.

Then there is reign, that period of time when a monarch rules, and it seems in England women hold the record for the longest reign, Queen Victoria, and Queen Elizabeth II

That’s distinct from the office oligarchs who seem to think they reign over the plebs

In a word: Pear

Now, how did such a simple word that described a piece of fruit become so tangled?

The English language of course.

It throws up many a variation of the same sounding word, just to confuse us.

Just think, there is also pair, and pare.

But a pear, that’s a piece of fruit.

And if you’re not careful things can go pear shaped very quickly.

Then there’s pair, which means there’s two of something the same, such as a pair of socks

Except in my house it’s more than likely that pair of socks are an odd pair.

Then there’s pare, which is to take the outer layer off such as an orange.

It can also mean to cut down, as in staff after restructuring an organisation.

In a word: Port

So, I wonder if it’s true, any port in a storm, except perhaps Marsailles

Or, if you are a lothario type sailor, you would have a girl in every port.

Yes, the most common definition of a port is a place where ships dock.

And, while talking of ships we don’t call the sides left and right, we call them port and starboard.  Just in case you didn’t know, port is the left side of the ship when facing forward.

And of course, ships have portholes, ie windows, traditionally round and rather small.

 

It could be an alcoholic drink, imbibed mostly after dinner with coffee and cigars, though no one seems to smoke cigars any more.

There is still coffee, for now.  No doubt sometime in the future someone will link it to death and dying, and it will fall out of favour, like sugar, weedkillers and asbestos.

The best port seems to come from Portugal, strange about that.

 

You can port a program (app in phone speak) from one platform to another, which basically means from Android to Apple IOS, but not without a reasonable amount of work.

It can also be an outlet plug on a computer that accepts cables from other devices (USB) and many years ago, a printer port, and a serial port.

 

In certain places in the world a port is a child’s schoolbag, a definition I was not aware of until we moved to a different state.

I’m still having a problem with it 30 years on.

In a word: Steal

You know how it goes, somebody breaks into your house and they steal the family jewels, which means, they’ve taken something that’s not theirs.

Baseballers will be well familiar with the term steal a base because that sneaky second base runner is trying to get to third, before the pitcher fires in a curveball.

But then there’s that same thief trying to rob you is stealing his way downstairs.

You come across a bargain, that is the seller doesn’t quite know what they’ve got and assumed it’s junk, that’s a steal.

On stage, one actor can steal the limelight from another.  if a film, an actor with a lesser part, can, if their good enough, steal the scene.

And if you’re lucky enough, you might steal a kiss, or just get slapped.

Then there’s the government, using a certain event to change the laws, and it might just steal your liberty.

This is not to be confused with the word steel, which means something else entirely, like a very malleable metal that’s low in carbon.

Or like most of our heroes, they have nerves of steel, or if they are like us, they need to steel themselves with a suitable fortification, rum is my choice.

But for me, I like the phrase, he had a steely look on his face and it was hard to tell if that was good or bad.

What a dazzling book cover can do…

And, of course, the description.

Probably one of the hardest things for a first-time author is not so much the writing but what is needed after the book is written.

You need a good description.  Short, sharp, incisive!

There’s a ream of advice out there, and I have read it all.

And, still, I got it wrong.

Then there is the cover.

I wanted simplistic, a short description to give the reader a taste of what’s in store, and let the story speak for itself.

No.

Apparently, a good cover will attract the reader to the book.

When I tendered my books on various sites to advertise them, sites such as Goodreads, and ThirdScribe, all was well with what I had done.

Then I submitted my books to a third site and they rejected the covers as too simplistic and the descriptions mundane, and wouldn’t post them.

Wow.

There’s a huge blow to the ego.  And just the sort of advice that would make a writer think twice about even bothering to continue.

But…

Perhaps the person who wrote that critique was being cruel to be kind.

At any rate, I am changing the covers, and rewording the descriptions.

Will it be a case of ‘what a difference a cover makes’?

In a word: Blue

We all know that blue is a colour.  in fact, it is my favourite colour, and I have owned so many blue cars over the years.

Odd then that I never painted any of my rooms blue, or the house, though one year my father painted our house a very nice shade of blue.

Enough with the memories…

We use blue to describe the sea or the sky, for instance, the deep blue sea, but if you look at it even n a good day, the sea generally looks green to me.

Blue could also be used to describe our mood when we are feeling melancholy or sad.

Then there’s the blues, a genre of music, usually in tandem with rhythm, so we have rhythm and blues

And when we’re angry we could scream blue murder, though that one seems to stretch the use of the word blue a little

Because I have red hair I get called bluey a lot, I’ll leave you to work that one out

You could be turning blue if you are very cold

It’s the second-lowest level of difficulty for a ski slope

And it could be used to describe a pornographic movie, i.e. a blue movie.

It is not to be confused with the word blew, where it is the action of expelling air through your mouth more forcefully than usual.

It blew a gale

He blew another man away (figuratively, not literally)

He blew .08 and lost his licence for drink driving

Searching for locations: Innsbruck, Austria

On this occasion, we drove from Florence to Innsbruck, a journey of about 500 kilometers and via the E45, a trip that would take us about five and a half hours.

We drove conservatively, stopped once for lunch and took about seven hours, arriving in Innsbruck late in the afternoon

The main reason for this stay was to go to Swarovski in Wattens for the second time, to see if anything had changed, and to buy some pieces.  We were still members of the club, and looking forward to a visit to the exclusive lounge and some Austrian champagne.

Sadly, there were no new surprises waiting, and we came away a little disappointed.

We were staying at the Innsbruck Hilton, where we stayed the last time, and it only a short walk to the old town.

From the highest level of the hotel, it is possible to get a look at the mountains that surround the city.  This view is in the direction we had driven earlier, from Florence.

The change in the weather was noticeable the moment we entered the mountain ranges.

This view looks towards the old town and overlooks a public square.

This view shows some signs of the cold, but in summer, I doubted we were going to see any snow.

We have been here in winter, and it is quite cold, and there is a lot of snow.  The ski resorts are not very far away, and the airport is on the way to Salzburg.

There is a host of restaurants in the old town, and we tried a few during our stay.  The food, beer, and service were excellent.

On a previous visit, we did get Swiss Army Knives, literally, from a small store called Victorinox.

And, yes, we did see the golden roof.

In a word: Right

Am I right?  Or is that correct?

In the moral sense, or in answering a question?

Do I have a right to …

As an entitlement?

Maybe

But right means generally to be correct, but the word itself can be used, like many others in a variety of ways

Such as, do we have any rights any more, since the government is slowly shutting down our freedoms, and, you guessed it, rights.

What about a right angle, we know this as being an angle of 90 degrees

How about I right a wrong, returning a bad situation to a good one?

Are you left-handed or right-handed?

Are you one of those people who can’t tell their left from their right?

And who was it that decided what was your left or your right, ever thought about that?  I didn’t until just now.  Good luck finding an answer on Google.

And how many times have you wished you were in the right place at the right time???

Then, of course, if English is a second language, how about confusing right with write.

Means something quite different, doesn’t it?

How about rite?  Yes, I guess if we were in the habit of chopping chicken heads off and dancing around a fire, that might be its meaning,

But…

It too has a lot of different meanings

Are you confused yet?

Searching for locations: Windsor Castle, London, England

A fine day, on this trip a rarity, we decided to take the train to Windsor and see the castle.

This is a real castle, and still in one piece, unlike a lot of castles.

Were we hoping to see the Queen, no, it was highly unlikely.

But there were a lot of planes flying overhead into Heathrow.  The wind must have been blowing the wrong day, and I’m sure, with one passing over every few minutes, it must annoy the Queen if she was looking for peace and quiet.

Good thing then, when it was built, it was an ideal spot, and not under the landing path.  I guess it was hard to predict what would happen 500 years in the future!

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I’m not sure if this was the front gate or back gate, but I was wary of any stray arrows coming out of those slits either side of the entrance.

You just never know!

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An excellent lawn for croquet.  This, I think, is the doorway, on the left, where dignitaries arrive by car.  The private apartments are across the back.

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The visitor’s apartments.  Not sure who that is on the horse.

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St George’s Chapel.  It’s a magnificent church for a private castle.  It’s been very busy the last few months with Royal weddings.

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The Round Tower, or the Keep.  It is the castle’s centerpiece.  Below it is the gardens.

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Those stairs are not for the faint-hearted, nor the Queen I suspect.  But I think quite a few royal children and their friends have been up and down them a few times.

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And well worth the effort to reach the bottom.

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Any faces peering out through the windows?

In a word: Bark

Here’s the thing, a bark is the sound made by a dog.  Isn’t it?  Apparently, it can also be from a fox or a seal

Not necessarily.  A man or woman can bark orders, especially if they are in the army.

And then, their bark might be worse than their bite, this usually refers to newspaper editors and school teachers.

You can theoretically be barking up the wrong tree, and believe me, I’ve done that a few times myself.

People can be barking mad.  Just go to any old spooky hospital that is named Belleview, and has a basement.  How do I know this, I’ve seen a lot of old black and white movies.

Then there’s that other type of bark, the outer layer of a lot of trees, and can be very useful as a top layer of a garden to keep the moisture in.

It can be thin sheets of chocolate with a thin layer of nuts or other confectionaries.

You can bark your shins, that is, scrape the skin off when you trip over a tree with bark.

Or just to complicate matters, there is also a barque, usually a three-masted sailing ship, though you don’t get to see many of them these days.