engineroomblog

So I haven't written anything here on The Engine Room since last summer. That's because I've been working on a new site, Cathedral City Guide . Why? Well, I was keen to build something in WordPress; my day job had moved almost totally away from subbing; and I wanted a new challenge. Most of all, my partner and I had visited half a dozen of England's medieval cathedral cities and we felt that collectively they deserved a website of their own. I probably won't be updating The Engine Room... Read Full Story

Unlikely as it sounds, I recently got involved in a drunken discussion on the difference between a tree, a bush and a plant. I Googled 'tree' on my smartphone and one of the first definitions I came across was: Something constructed in the form of, or considered as resembling, a tree, consisting of a stem, or stock, and branches; as, a genealogical tree. That's from the 1913 edition of Webster's. Now I'm sober, I understand what the definition is driving at - that 'tree' is... Read Full Story

The Engine Room didn't make it into bab.la and Lexiophiles' list of the 'Top 100 Language Blogs 2010', but if you voted for us then thank you. Although the list is dominated by teaching and translation blogs (which usually hold no great interest for me), a few of my favourite blogs are present - including Fritinancy and Sentence first . Well done! I'm going to propose to Sentence first that we form a coalition and introduce the alternative vote system. In the meantime, do check out this year... Read Full Story

This query has been emailed into The Engine Room: Is there a word which means that a person's visual identity is unknown? For example, the West End Whingers are often referred to as "anonymous" as people don't know what they look like. However, they are not anonymous as they really are called Phil and Andrew [the names given on the WEW website]. Is there a word for use in these circumstances? Well, 'anonymous' comes from the Greek for 'nameless', whereas Phil and Andrew, I suppose, are... Read Full Story

Nothing very exciting today - just a bit of image and caption duplication I spotted on BBC News a while back: I like capturing mistakes like these, not so I can feel smug, but because they are often corrected so quickly (especially on the BBC website). Somehow their ephemeral nature makes me want to preserve them for posterity. Read Full Story

During my time working on B2B transport mags and now websites, I've come across some interesting transport-related words. 'Crashworthiness' is one of my favourites. According to Wikipedia : Crashworthiness is the ability of a structure to protect its occupants during an impact. This is commonly tested when investigating the safety of vehicles. The OED online gives: The quality in an aircraft or motor-vehicle that makes it safer in the event of a crash. So crashworthy a. Its first quotation is... Read Full Story

According to BBC News (or more accurately, Pretoria News crime reporter Graeme Hosken), 50 odd people are killed every day in South Africa. Sometimes it pays to be normal. Read Full Story

Through Fuelmyblog I've had the chance to sample some absinthe from Absinthe-Shop . What's that got to do with language use and journalism? Well, I could mention the (tired) stereotype of hard-drinking journalists , or talk about the connection between absinthe and writers such as Arthur Rimbaud and Guy de Maupassant. But really, I just wanted to try the absinthe. What I got to sample was La Clandestine , a Swiss 'la bleue' absinthe (which is neither blue, nor indeed green, but clear). It... Read Full Story

Celebrity chef Antony Worrall Thompson is a man of few words. One word, in fact - and that word is 'gravadlax'. I spotted this on the BBC homepage a few days ago. Read Full Story

Last year The Engine Room took part in bab.la and Lexiophiles' 'Top 100 Language Blogs' competition, coming eighth in the 'Language Professionals' category and 45th overall . The 2010 competition is now under way and the blog is competing in the same category as before. User votes count for 50% of the final score so please vote for us (well, me) using this button: I'm not sure whether I'm even a "language professional" any more - probably not. But it's just a bit of fun - and a good way to... Read Full Story