Say Something Nice Day!

Nada cuesta añadir una sonrisa, ‘It costs nothing to add a smile’, is a Spanish phrase imprinted on my memory from when, years ago, I taught myself to touch-type in Spanish and it was one of the practice phrases. It’s an apt recollection, for 1 June is Say Something… Read More

11 Gen Z words you need to know

We love it when new words become a hot topic of conversation and the last few weeks, ‘cheugy’ has been sweeping social media. In case you missed it, ‘cheugy’ surfaced on TikTok and has been defined as ‘the opposite of trendy’. If you’re a cheug, your sense of style is… Read More

7 new words added to Collins Dictionary

Here are seven of the latest new words added to Collins English Dictionary online. A few of the terms in this update might seem a little on the negative side, with the inclusion of the underhand practice of ‘sealioning’ and the rather harsh judgment implied in ‘ugly cry’. The consequences… Read More

National Limerick Day

There was an old dictionary buff Whose dog snorted mountains of snuff. Himself, so we hear, Preferred to quaff beer, A brew it found frightfully duff. Ah, limericks! The verse form that trips off the tongue like no other. Once particularly popular with rugby teams and the forces, they are the one kind of… Read More

7 Shakespearean words to add to your vocabulary

It’s English Language Day! The annual event where language lovers come together to celebrate the great William Shakespeare and a chance to celebrate multilingualism in English-speaking countries around the globe. We’re celebrating with this list of 7 Shakespearean words to weave into your vocabulary. Without further ado, let us go… Read More

What is brain fog anyway?

Brain fog has been on people’s minds in more ways than one during the pandemic and after the recent lockdownversary. Whether you’re struggling to concentrate in meetings, finding creative thinking nearly impossible, or you’ve lost interest in cracking into that latest bestseller, brain fog has become… Read More

Restore Our Earth

April 22 is Earth Day and this year’s slogan is ‘Restore Our Earth.’ Earth Day is older than you might suspect. So attuned are we now to environmental anxiety, aka solastalgia, that it’s easy to presume such an ecologically aware event must be a recent institution. Read More

Cracking the police code: 11 Line of Duty acronyms explained

BBC’s Line of Duty is back after a two-year hiatus and we couldn’t be more excited to resume our role of armchair detective. But for civilians, deciphering all the police jargon can be pretty difficult. When you’re busy nicking bent coppers, you don’t have time to waste on trivial things… Read More

Lockdownversary

The twenty-third of March marks the anniversary of the first UK lockdown, that fateful Monday evening when the PM announced drastic measures to halt the spread of COVID-19. On social media there is talk of a lockdownversary, a portmanteau word which shows how elastic English is. Read More