Friday Fun: You can’t say “sh” in Spanish
This 4-minute TED Talk explains how the lack of “sh”explains why we use the letter X to mean “the unknown.” You know like Planet X. X-ray. Gen-X. X-Men. X-rated.
Cheers!
This 4-minute TED Talk explains how the lack of “sh”explains why we use the letter X to mean “the unknown.” You know like Planet X. X-ray. Gen-X. X-Men. X-rated.
Cheers!
I’ve written about malapropisms before. If you want a diversion that involves word play with malapropisms today, try this game from Oxford Dictionaries. Example: The muscles around the stomach are known as the abominable muscles. Answer: Abdominal (‘abominable’ means ‘detestable’). A prospectus is someone who searches for gold. After a long air flight, it is reassuring to get your feet back…
Got that frivolous Friday feeling? I have exams to grade so, naturally, I was looking for a diversion this morning and thought I’d share three of my attempts. Diversion 1: Identify the pun performed by today’s photo from doozzle. Diversion 2: Check out the pronunciation humor in this Berlitz ad. Diversion 3: Watch the short video on…
As promised, I am working on video tutorials devoted to punctuation usage that distracts business readers from the intended message. But I must concentrate on my day job AGAIN today. So I am sharing this post on punctuation from Marian Dougan’s Words to good effect blog. Enjoy!
I saw this last week and thought I would share it today because I don’t have time to write much. (I’m in Atlanta for a few days at the AACSB Accreditation Conference.) According to a cab driver from Cairo, car horns are used by drivers there to communicate more than their frustration. Several morse-code like…
Over at the NY Times, Errol Morris has conducted a very interesting test of the effect of typeface (you might call it “font”) on credibility. His article is definitely worth a read, but it requires a time commitment. For those of you who want the gist, use Baskerville if you want to maximize your credibility. In case…
Writing is a 5,000-year-old technology developed for commercial purposes like keeping a record of agricultural products. Ancient Scripts is an awesome resource to learn more about the world’s writing systems. This TED Ed lesson is a brief introduction. Speaking came thousands of years before writing. All writing that has developed since its invention can be traced…