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When did the US start dropping the U from words such as colour?
Did the American’s hi-jack the English language and have applied what seems, on the face of it, some rather arbitary descions to spell various words differently. Why remove the U from words like colour? In this article we look at the rather querky reasons for this.
Ahoy there … 9 Fascinating Nautical Terms
Britain is a nautical nation. Indeed her Empire was built on the command of the seas. So it’s not surprising that the nautical world has contributed many of it’s specialised terms to the English language, terms we use every day often without knowing their true meaning or origin. In this article we’ve brought together some of those terms to help you ‘navigate’ the world of ‘Nautical Speak’....
Sir Isaac Brock, Guernseyman and Hero of Upper Canada
Guernseyman General Sir Isaac Brock is credited with saving Canada for the Empire from the attack by the Americans 1812. Knowing how much the Canadians gave in manpower and support in the 2 World Wars to Britain, who knows, but if he had failed the history and fate of modern Britain may have been very different indeed.
To Discover Strange New Worlds – Columbus’ Venture into the Unknown
Wednesday October 12th 1492 was no ordinary day, for on this day Christopher Columbus reached the New World. On that day, after sailing across the Atlantic Ocean, the Italian explorer sighted a Bahamian island, believing he had reached East Asia.
Why do Buses Come in Threes ?
Everybody knows that if you want to catch a bus, you spend ages waiting and then three will come at once. That at least is the urban myth which is popular enough to become the title of a book. According to mathematicians, however, it really is a myth. Buses don’t usually come in threes, they come in twos, and the reason why this is so can be found in this article.
Lost in Translation V – Misadventures in English
English is the global language of communication which means that when it collides with local languages it can have hilarious results. Here we’ve gathered together the results of some of the planets finest misadventures in English.
When did people start freezing food for preservation ?
“Why not collect the ice off our ponds and sell it in the tropics?” – Well actually that’s exactly what they did. In this article we take a look at a potted history of how mankind developed freezing food in order to preserve it.
Dropping in on the Big Bang
In the days of analogue TV you turned into a channel through various UHF frequencies. If you stopped tuning before you found a channel, you’d see a screen full of ‘snow’ – white dots . Some of that ‘snow’ is a sign of the Big Bang , although nobody was aware of its significance until the 1960s.
Out of the mouths of babes oft times come gems – more school test funnies.
As the saying goes “Out of the mouths of babes oft times come gems” … and those gems can sometimes be extremely hilarious indeed. We’ve gathered together some of the things that children have written at school in response to tests
The Ultimate Conspiracy Theory – The Phantom Time Hypothesis
Ok, hang on to your hats, this conspiracy theory must be the Daddy of them all – The Phantom Time Hypothesis. In a Nutshell (pun intended) According to the Phantom Time Hypothesis theory, the period between 614 ad and 911AD didn’t exist; the history normally attributed to that time is either a misinterpretation or a deliberate falsification of the evidence. If this were true, Charlemagne (reigned 768-814) never existed and the...
