Today's posts

The poem today is ‘A strange thing happened’.  

So much of what happens to us from day to day seems to depend on luck. In the letter I’m sending you from my terrace I mention Orwell’s essay ‘Politics and the English language’. There he quotes from the Authorised Version’s Book of Ecclesiastes 9:11:

“I returned and saw under the sun, that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet favour to men of skill; but time and chance happeneth to them all.”

So time and chance happen to us all.

The letter from my terrace is about the words we use.  In a recent post I complained about the words ‘out there’ and how they add nothing to what a sentence really means.  I’ve just heard a gardening programme where the presenter talked of roses. ‘There are plenty of new varieties out there.’ What a waste of breath the words ‘out there’ are.

Today I’m making a plea for some new words to replace those that are worn out by overuse.