How to Poo on a Date wins Diagram Prize
How to Poo on a Date has won the 36th annual Diagram Prize for Oddest Book Title of the Year.
The book, by Mats & Enzo, published by Prion Press, topped a public vote to find the oddest title, in one of the closest contests in prize history. In the end, How to Poo on a Date: The Lovers’ Guide to Toilet Etiquette, took home the title with 30% of the vote, beating into second place Are Trout South African? by Duncan Brown (Pan South Africa) and The Origin of Feces by David Waltner-Toews (ECW Press), which both captured 23% of voters.
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Why grammar isn’t cool – and why that may be about to change
Despite its reputation, grammar is colourful and fascinating. Now experts report a renewed interest in the subject
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Taking a selfie
In front of the window of a candy store in Peebles, a small town about an hour’s drive south of Edinburgh, an elderly American woman approached a gentleman she didn’t know and, holding out a cell phone, asked:
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Undivided by a Common Language/Much Ado About Not Much?
The alleged chasm that separates American from British English is often discussed in highly emotional terms. It probably won’t make me popular on either side of the Atlantic when I say that I think the differences have been wildly, insanely overstated. To cite just one example, I once met a British woman in Edinburgh who told me loudly and confidently that Americans had completely abandoned the use of adverbs.
and:
Geoffrey Pullum–the distinguished grammarian and my fellow contributor to the Chronicle of Higher Education’s “Lingua Franca” blog–has a post up there today asserting that the so-called differences between American English and British English are exaggerated.
metaphraze 