Cycling UK Forum

thirdcrank wrote:Perhaps we should start ending attempts at humour with "geddit??!?!?!"

"geddit??!?!?!" (Sorry for that.)

No! That spoils the fun!!

Don't be too hard on English; it's a bit of a mulatto among languages and therein lies it's charm. It's mongrel vigor.

I've just been out for a short ride and have obviously shaken up a few little grey cells.
I got to wondering, mid ride, if greengrocers can have their own apostrophe, why not other trades and professions.
I wonder for instance,what a builder's apostrophe would look like. They have their own cleavage, so why not an apostrophe to go with it ?

A doctor's apostrophe; found in the appendix, perhaps?

cancel culture. "canceling" people. A form of policing ideas normally from the left who think you dont think in the right way. ( I listened to a guy -professor pinker- on radio 4 world at one today who some ( 550 "academics" )had tried to cancel. Its a terrible thing that has risen hand in hand with BLM & the LGBQT rights movement?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Online_shaming

professor pinker
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/07/16/harvard-professor-stephen-pinker-attacked-550-academics-tweets/

“Steve is too big for this kerfuffle to affect him,” he said. “But it’s depressing that an erudite and reasonable scholar is seen by a lot of intelligent people as an undercover monster.”

Some are tying to do the same to J K Rowling it seems?

'Othering' as a verb, seen that on these fora, couldnae find it in my thesaurus

Can anyone provide meaning(s), synonyms?

OED:
https://www.oed.com/view/Entry/263193
https://www.oed.com/view/Entry/263203

Wiktionary:
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/othering

Wikipedia:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Other_(philosophy)

Some of these are as a noun, but the meaning as a verb is obvious.

Jonathan

You're welcome.

Jonathan

Not new to me but how often is the term "belisha beacon" used these days?

thirdcrank wrote:Not new to me but how often is the term "belisha beacon" used these days?

Not often I would guess, even rarer in a sentence that includes Post Office bicycles !

Picture taken in 2005.

My late M-in-L who died about ten years ago still spoke of the GPO. My wife sometimes does, mainly out of nostalgia for a proper post office.

Who today knows what a GPO was?

Oldjohnw wrote:... Who today knows what a GPO was?

I do, but no feelings of nostalgia. (I thought it was the GPO.)

thirdcrank wrote:

Oldjohnw wrote:... Who today knows what a GPO was?

I do, but no feelings of nostalgia. (I thought it was the GPO.)

It was. As my post said in the first para. I used the wrong article in the second. I won't apologise. It was a slip.

Oldjohnw wrote: ... It was. As my post said in the first para. I used the wrong article in the second. I won't apologise. It was a slip.

I didn't intend to seem picky. My memory of post offices, from the large Crown Offices, to the tiniest Branch Post Office is of people who thought they were the last line of defence against crime: positive vetting necessary to buy a book of stamps. Everybody a suspect.

TTBOMK ('t t bomk')
To the best of my knowledge

I don't know if it has been used on these forums but one of the most stupidly over- and wrongly-used terms we've had in recent times is "game changing.".

thirdcrank wrote:Not new to me but how often is the term "belisha beacon" used these days?

Not that often, presumably because pedestrian crossings are usually now "Pelican" crossings. Or "Toucan".

However, as a loiner, you'll be fascinated to know (well, maybe not) that a brand new pedestrian crossing on Street Lane was built with Belisha beacons, rather than red/amber/green traffic lights.

Also, it must be cool to be Mr Belisha:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belisha_beacon