Twofer Wednesday - Limiting the options

Driving back home the other day, we were passed by someone in a bit of a hurry.

Relative speeds not captured, sadly.

In Britain, the national speed limit on normal roads is 60 mph - unless otherwise stated, of course. On dual carriageways and motorways, this goes up to 70 mph - again, unless there are signs telling you otherwise.

On this occasion, I estimated that the now rapidly-disappearing dot in the distance was going at least ninety. At times like this, I wish I could just open the window and drop a flashing blue light onto the roof of the car...

Splitting hairs, but I suppose it would be an entertaining defence to try out in court...

Have a tune.

Define 'tidy'...

Moving from Wednesday, when we were discussing the pets of a friend of mine, we go to my friend herself - or, more precisely, one of her daughters.

Sam, it seems has managed to craft and near-perfect the habit of not tidying up after herself. And before you say it, Julie, I know she still won't be as bad as me.

Sharron, Sam's mother, asked her several times to clear away all the toys, books and what have you. Asked, cajoled, ordered, and commanded. In the end, in fear of tripping over something and hurting herself, Sharron gave in to the inevitable and did it , as mothers all-too often do.

Naturally, Sam can tell the difference between a cluttered, messy room, and a tidy one. Not that she commented upon it when she came home from school. Even when her mother raised the subject, Sam remained unimpressed.

...somebody pass me a dictionary, please. I think I've been getting it wrong all this time...

Pay (lots) to play

Anyone who knows me knows that I have an inordinate fondness for facts. Whether they be relevant to something in my life, or just useless trivia, I will usually read about it and think, "well I never." Among the Giles annuals and Pratchett books in my own personal library, there are a number of non-fiction books. Many are to do with natural history, but others will stray out into other sciences, language, history and even mathematics.

Yes, I am a word nerd.

For our wedding, we bucked a few trends; we made our own table centrepieces (with hedgehogs, of course), we insulted the registrar (link), and we made our own wedding favours, to be opened as the meal began. Intended to be something to help relative strangers strike up conversation with each other, we included, along with the ubiquitous sugared almonds, a few chocolate coins, a cheap toy such as you may find inside a Christmas cracker - and a folded piece of paper, upon which was written the following; a joke ("Two fish were in a tank. one said to the other, 'how do you drive this bloody thing?'") and a factoid, a little snippet to make people wonder.

To that end, books like this were invaluable.

Crammed with all sort of useless cra.. uh, information, this and others like it are fun reading. Especially when you are stuck in the smallest room in the house for a while...

I don't know which book it was, but one of my trivia books had a section on words that have been adopted into English from various other languages. And then proceeded to give us a literal translation of said word. For example...

Ba-dum TISH!

Teletlikeitis

In the car one day, we were waiting at a junction to a dual carriageway. Waiting and waiting; it's a busy stretch of road.
Just before the junction, on the dual carriageway itself, there is a pedestrian crossing, the type where you need to press a button for the lights to change.

Unfortunately for us, there was not a pedestrian in sight, and I starting hoping aloud for one to come and push that damn button so the lights would change and thereby allow us out.

Julie suggested I tried to do it by telepathy. I could have let it slide and accepted the sentiment, but I'm a picky bugger and I have a very strong didactic streak in me, so I took the opportunity to explain the correct term and the difference between the two.

Very quick, and - in my view - pretty much spot-on these days. Ironic, though, as I'm not the one that watches X Factor...

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ps: If you're wondering about the title, try saying aloud.