It’s been a tiring week, mostly because I came down with a virus last weekend (I’m very glad I scheduled four posts to appear before I was stricken!) so I’m looking forward to collapsing a bit. AND seeing my dear friend Mel, who is visiting Oxford. I hope you all have equally fun plans! And if you don’t, solace yourself with a book, a link, and a blog post.
1.) The book – who’d have thought that one of the new books I’m most excited about would be a graphic novel? I loved the colourful, gentle touch of Brecht Evens’ The Wrong Place, so different to the brash superhero-comic-style of many graphic novels (but not all, of course.) So I asked Jonathan Cape if they’d be kind enough to send me his latest, and they very nicely did – it’s called The Making Of and it looks to have the same aesthetic. I will, of course, tell you more when I’ve read it.
2.) The link – is to the first post I’ve written in my new job at OxfordWords! Actually, the first one I wrote will be appearing on Tuesday – this post, on ‘5 Words You Didn’t Know Were Acronyms‘, was written yesterday as a quick substitute for something else – but it was great fun to write, and might surprise you.
3.) The blog post – I’m afraid I’ve been pretty rubbish at commenting on posts this week, from my sickbed, but I’ve been reading ’em. Mary/Mrs. Miniver’s Daughter has some lovely mural images in her latest post. She seems to be at an exhibition every other hour, and I must follow her example and try to get to the British Murals and Decorative Painting 1910-1970 exhibition before it closes on 9th March.
What fun! Never heard of quango in my life, but I knew about scuba and laser. I'll blame the grandfather in the movie version of Chitty-Chitty Bang Bang for the POSH acronym being so believable. (Now I've got the song stuck in my head…Posh with a capital P-O-S-H…)
Wishing you a full recovery!
Ha! I don't remember the song, I have to confess, but I did used to love the film…
Hello Simon! I am Susan in TX's second dd, and I am quite familiar with POSH. I didn't know about the acronym for care packages– a fascinating and well-written article.
Lovely to hear from you! How nice :)
And thanks so much! I have to say, I was very surprised about care package.
I knew about those acronyms except for POG (probably due to being a child in the 1960-70 period). Thought you might have mentioned that LASER comes from modifying MASER. Why are you surprised to be excited about a graphic novel? Have you not warmed to them before or is it a style that you assumed you wouldn't like?
Hope you are better soon; I was in Oxford yesterday and hope to be back a little more often this year so perhaps we could meet up for tea and arguments (sorry, erudite discussions). ;-)
The OED entry does say that it developed from 'maser', but I thought the connection was unlikely to enlighten many people!
I think it's just my prejudice against graphic novels – so the surprise is that I have overcome my prejudice, rather than any quality assessment of the books themselves!
I look forward to seeing you in Oxford one day before too long :)