Tag Archives: The Week

Gross words for fine wines

Posted on January 22, 2014 | 1 comment

As you probably know, I’m a bit of a wine lover, a swirl-and-sniff kind of a guy. So I’m fairly familiar with the sometimes surprising terminology used to describe the smell and taste of wines. My latest article for TheWeek.com looks at some of the more off-putting terms that somehow mean something delicious:

17 disgusting descriptions for delicious wines

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I myself think people get too bothered about it

Posted on January 15, 2014 | Leave a comment

My latest article for TheWeek.com is about something some people get quite bent out of shape about: use of myself for purposes other than the reflexive. See what I have to say, and why:

Myself, I don’t see a problem

 

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Californian accent? Or Canadian?

Posted on January 7, 2014 | 2 comments

My latest article for TheWeek.com is about the similarities between the typical Californian accent and the typical Canadian one:

Why it’s difficult to tell a Canadian accent from a Californian one

For fun, Google some news or weather videos from Canadian TV stations and from Californian ones. Give them a listen, and you may be surprised just how similar they can be.

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Sci-fi/fantasy name? Or prescription drug?

Posted on December 26, 2013 | Leave a comment

My latest article for TheWeek.com is a quiz. It’s a really hard quiz (but also fun):

Quiz: Drug brand or sci-fi name?

But after the quiz I explain just why it’s so hard to tell them apart. So do it… and live long and fill that prescription!

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Wah-wah in podcast

Posted on December 16, 2013 | 1 comment

The Week has a section of podcasts – audio versions of some of its articles. We’ve made one of my most recent article, on wah-wah pedals and acoustic phonetics. Now you can hear me narrating it and listen to the examples mentioned all in one easy six-and-a-half-minute shot. It’s at theweek.com/article/index/254186/the-science-of-making-a-guitar-sound-like-a-human-voice or soundcloud.com/theweek/the-science-of-making-a-guitar.

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What puts the “wah” in the wah-wah?

Posted on December 10, 2013 | 1 comment

My latest article for TheWeek.com is really an introduction to acoustic phonetics. But it’s catchier to approach it from the Jimi Hendrix angle…

The science of making a guitar sound like a human voice

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Between you and I, could you take a picture of my friends and I?

Posted on December 3, 2013 | Leave a comment

My latest article for TheWeek.com deals with a popular issue: pronouns in compound objects (the things in my title, above, that may have your teeth grinding). I talk about not just the rule but why so many people find it so hard to stick to it. The article is

‘You and I’ vs. ‘You and me’

In the past couple of days, I’ve also added a couple of longer posts on grammar. One of them tears to bits a web page of grammar advice: Why it’s best to leave grammar advice to experts. The other does a detailed dismantling and analysis of a potentially confusing sentence from a recent award-winning book: A little Hellgoing sentence mechanical deconstruction.

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Capital Letters: WHY? And how?

Posted on November 23, 2013 | Leave a comment

My latest article for TheWeek.com is on capital letters, one of the great plagues of the average Anglophone. When do you and don’t you use them? And WHY DO WE EVEN HAVE THEM? These Questions Will Be Answered… in

Capital letters: FTW or WTF?

 

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Bang! “Ow!”

Posted on November 12, 2013 | Leave a comment

My latest article for TheWeek.com is about the way different languages codify the sound of, say, knocking your shin against a piece of furniture… and your response to it. From language to language, it’s similar in some ways, but different in others:

Why pain is expressed differently in different languages

 

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Why the clicks?

Posted on October 31, 2013 | 2 comments

Imagine if someone, instead of saying your name, replaced the first consonant of it with “tsk!” – for instance, “Tsk! ames” for “James.” Now imagine that that was somehow more polite than just saying your name. Now imagine that English started adding clicks to its words just for that sort of reason. Well, it’s already happened in Zulu and Xhosa – it’s how they got their clicks. Find out more in my latest article for TheWeek.com:

A brief history of African click words

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