After my post on fears and phobias last month, a few people asked me if there was a specific name for the fear of scorpions. Scorpions belong to the arachnid family of animals so ‘arachnophobia’ would cover the fear of them and spiders, too. This started me thinking about what the most common phobias are …
A few weeks ago, I mentioned a man who died by drowning in chocolate. There was another unusual death in this article on the BBC website a few days ago. The article mentions that the lady was a ‘shopaholic‘. A ‘shopaholic’ is someone who is addicted to shopping. We often use the suffix ‘-holic’ to …
I mentioned the word ‘netbook’ in a post last week about Windows 7. Here it is in the BBC news again with a really detailled descriptions of the pros and cons (advantages and disadvantages) of netbooks. The first expression that caught my eye in this article was in the fifth paragraph: The firm’s Eee PC …
I saw a great word in the news today mentioned in this article in the Telegraph. ‘Gazumping‘ (also spelled ‘gadzumping’) is when a potential house-buyer has agreed on a price with the seller and put down a deposit, then someone else offers the seller more and ends up buying the house instead of the original …
This article on Reuters.com caught my attention today. I thought it was an interesting way to deal with a tricky problem and couldn’t imagine many other world leaders coming up with such a solution. There is some interesting vocabulary in the third paragraph: prompting an outcry from police groups and a resulting media blitz. A …
I think people all over the world are worried about Swine Flu. It’s a topic that has really had a lot of exposure in the news recently. I will be very relieved when there is an effective vaccine made available and that’s why this article on Reuters.com caught my attention. The first piece of medical …
‘Paving the way‘ made another appearance this week in this article I saw on cnet.com yesterday. I don’t really use windows unless I have to but this article and the comments underneath it made me want to at least try Windows 7 to see what it’s like. Maybe I’ll give it a go over the …
We all know ‘espresso’ is a delicious kind of strong coffee but did you know it’s also the name of an amazing new printing machine? The Guardian has a great article about it here. I love reading and I’m often frustrated when I can’t get a book I want because it is out of print …