Pylimitics

Here is a scene that’s ironic in a way that’s not obvious. “The general surveyed the wide, grassy plain where his army had just won the final battle in a long series. He sipped a glass of champagne in relief and celebration.”  The question is, what’s ironic about that? Is it the general’s relief? Is… Continue reading

A “gauntlet” is a kind of glove. Originally it was a reinforced glove that was the part of medieval armor that protected the hand. Even today a “gauntlet” would usually be a glove of the larger, sturdier sort. But gauntlets weren’t just used for protection. A gauntlet might have been thrown down to signal a… Continue reading

You hear it all the time: “third-world countries,” or “that’s a first-world problem.” But you hardly ever hear about the second world. And oddly enough, even though the whole idea of categorizing nations as first-, second-, and third-world hasn’t been around all that long, today’s phrases have already shifted in meaning from their original usage.… Continue reading

An oversight of oversight Having oversight of something means you’re in charge of it, or managing it. It’s a pretty old word, and has been used to mean some form of authority or supervision for centuries. Queen Margaret of Anjou used “oversight” in this way in a letter from about 1421: “Send sum trusty man… Continue reading

Gardens are shut down this time of year, but you’ve got the whole winter to plan to fit out your plot with “Cotswold stone retaining walls; vaguely Spanish wrought iron gates; crazy paving… colored yellow, green, and pink; irregular ponds of pale blue fibreglass fed by streams of impossible source; gnomes, fairies, and animals, usually… Continue reading