Asian Georgia is separated from Russia by the Caucasus Mountains. It has a coast on the Black Sea, shares a border with Turkey to the west, and has boundaries with Azerbaijan and Armenia to the east and south. All these proximities have affected Georgia in one way or the other (usually the other) throughout her history. (more…)
Government, politics, wars and spying are subjects in which evasion and deceit are common and vulgar; hypocrisy is paramount and prudery prominent. The survival of politicians in politics in a democracy or for that matter in a despotism, depends on getting control over your compatriots, and retaining it by convincing them of your admirable fitness for rule. (more…)
Present:
I work = I work hard all day
Past:
I worked = I worked hard all last year.
Future:
I will work = I will work hard after I have finished my exams.
Present Continuous or Present Progressive: (made with the verb TO BE)
I am working = I am working at the moment on a nuclear project.
Present Perfect: (made by using the vern TO HAVE; this tense indicates a mixture of the past and the present)
I have worked = I have worked hard all my life.
Past Perfect: (a sense of something that is now in the past, but no longer exists)
I had worked = I had worked hard all my life until I retired.
Future Perfect: (a sense of something that lies in the future, but that also has roots in the past and present, always used with the main verb in the past participle – worked)
I will have worked = I will have worked hard all my life even when I am too old to work . . . because I love work!
Present Perfect Continuous (use of the verbs To HAVE and TO BE plus the main verb. A sense of the present, past and future in a continuous manner):
I have been working = I have been working for a considerable time on this project.
Past Perfect Continuous (something that was continuous, but which had to stop)
I had been working for months on the project, but last year I was forced to retire from it!
Future Perfect Continuous (the same as the Future Perfect, but with a continuous sense):
I will have been working on this project for twenty years by this time next year.
(a sense of someone looking back over the last 19 years, while still working, and looking forward to another year’s work, after which the 20 years will be completed)
SPECIAL NOTE: The Conditional tense is made by adding the word would:-
I would work all the time if I had a job.
I would be working if only I could find a job
I would have been working hard all day if I had not been so lazy!
I would have worked very well as a public relations officer.
ETC.
Another special note:- The –ing suffix indicates the Present Participle of the verb: working. The –ed suffix indicates the Past Participle of the verb: worked.
Transitive: Transitive verbs are those which require to be followed by a direct object: example:- These verbs are bloody difficult. You could not say ‘these verbs are’
The direct object is ‘bloody difficult’.
Scipio / makethelist.net
This extraordinary Roman general was born in 185 BC, and was later adopted by Publius Cornelius Scipio. One must be careful to avoid confusion, because both adoptive grandfather Publius and our subject were nicknamed ‘Africanus’ for the same reason! Grandson Aemilianus earned the tribute for destroying Carthage during the 3rd Punic War, and Publius for merely defeating Carthage in the 2nd Punic War. The adoptive grandfather, born in 236 BC, was actually called ‘Africanus Major’. (more…)
This broadcasting company has radio and TV channels and business channels run by experts. Beyond doubt this communications group helped Spanish people make up their minds about the nearly eight years of Zapatero’s disastrous administration, which was democratically ended a year ago next Sunday. It is now Thursday. On November 20th, 2011 the General Election results silenced the PSOE and awarded the PP an absolute majority which they seem loath to use. This is all fine and historical but what about Intereconomía?
The station is a part of the daily newspaper La Gaceta, a journal still not mentioned by state-owned television among their ‘distinguished’ list, which includes the Marxist/Socialist organ of the PSOE El País; the heavily right-wing mouthpiece of its chief editor Ramírez – El Mundo; the official spokesmen of the centre-right ABC: a few regional newspapers blindly not including El Día (Canary Islands), and that odd mixture of cultures and opinions La Vanguardia. (more…)
This is one of the planet’s biggest and most unknown continents. It surrounds the South Pole, and lies almost entirely to the south of latitude 66º 33’ S. This is called ‘The Antarctic Circle’.
Travellers who have dared to enter this formidable area of the Earth have noted that the sun neither rises at midwinter nor sets at midsummer. At the South Pole itself the temperature is on average -50º C; this is because an excessively thick icecap covers the continent, forming a huge plateau. Strong winds invariably blow from the centre of the icecap, and it usually too cold to snow. The little snow that does fall takes hundreds of years to change into ice. The ice moves so grindingly slowly that parts of the icecap are millions of years old. (more…)
It is undeniable that the jockey’s jacket or blouse, worn only during horseracing, is an inseparable part of the mystique of this Sport of Kings, and indeed it is most picturesque. Evolution has been slow from the first appearance of the racing blouse, but a beautiful tradition has developed at the same time – workmanship, materials, forms and colours, even things whimsical adorning it.
At first, owners’ horses ran without any special decoration appearing in their riders’ clothes. Most wore the classic red or blue ‘chemise’, along with a black cap on the head. Eventually, coinciding with the arrival of rules about the amount of weight to be carried on the horse’s back,, and the increasing number of participants, it was found necessary to insist on recognizable ‘colours’ being worn while racing.
The material used had to be light and comfortable, enabling the rider to move in it freely. It had to be of virtually no weight, because of the new rules. It should be flexible because of a jockey’s need to lean forward encouraging his mount; he must be able to use the whip etc., so among the materials chosen were silk (for the richer owners) which gave distinction as much to the owner’s colours as to the jockey himself: Nylon (after it had been invented), is economical and widely used, and fine wool, used more in races with obstacles such as jumps, where jockey weight was less important and where temperatures might be lower, especially in England and France. (more…)
Gibraltar: contentious since 1704
The spiky old issue of Gibraltar is digging Spanish and British statesmen in the most tender part of their well-fed anatomies – what to do with Gibraltar? Ever since the signing of the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713 (very nearly three hundred years ago), the two puissant old ladies have been scratching at each other’s eyes because of Gibraltar. (more…)
Anglo-Saxon men / fashion.era.com
They were Jutes, a Germanic tribe whose names are preserved today in Jutland and Juteborg. They invaded Britain in the 5th century under the leadership of Hengist and Horsa. The Venerable Bede tells us they occupied the Isle of Wight, parts of the Hampshire coast, and Kent with its capital at Canterbury. They were also Saxons, (Germanic) though they came from the Danish peninsula, and lived partly from piracy from the 3rd century AD to the 5th, when they invaded Britain at the end of Roman supremacy. Their name survives in Wessex, Essex, Sussex and Saxony in Germany itself. The Saxons and Jutes were joined by the Angles, Germanic in origin who probably came from the area of Schleswig-Holstein or neighbouring Denmark. They settled down in East Anglia and Northumbria. Their name survives in the gradual metamorphosis from Anglo-Saxon England to Englaland and thence to England. (more…)
An unusual impression of the great monster when still young, playing (royal) tennis / flickriver.com
“History!” snorted an ex-pupil of mine the other day, “nothing but kings and dates!” I am not even sure if History is still taught in British schools of the present day. Most children one meets know nothing at all about Britain’s past, good or bad. They might recognise a few of the names – Alfred (‘wasn’t he a Viking?’), Budicca or Boadicea (‘she had scythes on her chariot’s wheels isn’t it?’), Nelson (‘he won at Waterloo!’), Wellington ‘the French shot him at Trafsomething?’) etc. etc. Ministers of Education ensure that English is taught so that pupils mispronounce the words and cannot write them. (more…)