He is one of those orators of whom it was well said, ‘Before they get up, they do not know what they are going to say; when they…
Category: Humour
Dorothy Parker: some things worth remembering . . .
She was born Dorothy Rothschild (nothing to do with the bankers) in 1893 and died just over seventy in 1967. She was American, one of the founders of…
Some more eccentricities of pronunciation
Some more eccentricities of pronunciation Spanish television announcers are lax when it comes to telling the viewers about the films they interminably show. Perhaps they do it on…
‘Lecturas’ puts its foot in it again
This is a pinkish Spanish glossy magazine published with great success throughout Spain. It mostly deals with ‘celebrities’ whatever they are; it is not in my list of…
State theft or The Dissolution of the Monasteries
In civilized society there is a multitude of ways used by ‘the authorities’ to extract money from citizens like squeezing pips from a lemon or orange. Clever people,…
A law in urgent need of repeal: the Royal Marriages Act
Yes I know that the majority of you don’t give a stuff about royalty anyway but quite a few nations prefer their Head of State to wear a…
English section: Gobbledegook & Officialese
An onomatopoeic word is one that derives its meaning from the sound it makes. The accepted dictionary word ‘gobbledegook’ decidedly comes from the sound made by most poultry…
Saturday Spoofs; early April Fool’s Day biographies
Pilloch, N.G., Baron Pilloch of Bedwetty was born one day during the Second World War. He became a Socialist after losing his temper with a nanny who possesed…
Sturdy Beggars
In the so-called ‘developed’ societies since the end of the Second World War many children are brought up by unthinking parents to believe that work is something…
SPAIN: from black comedy to farce
Not even the Monty Python team could have invented the present situation in the democracy with a monarchy, Parliament, and civilized population called Spain. The Marx Brothers…