Gardyloo!

  Suppose you were walking along the street of a European town in the year 1650. Suddenly, someone yells,  “Gardyloo!” Then, you’d better duck, fast. Gardyloo was a warning that somebody was just about to tip a bucket of something pretty awful and foul-smelling out of an upstairs window onto the street. Words are like […]

Come Mosey With Me

This morning, my thoughts are just moseying here and there, and going a far piece back into memory. Not sure what moseying means? Well, I’ve heard it all my life. It’s an old term that means to amble or to walk at a slow pace. That word, moseying, got me started thinking about other words […]

About Those Words

Words! We speak them, write them, sing them. I’ve read a theory that words we say remain in the air forever and could be picked up on the correct frequency by the correct electrical receptors. That sounds a bit far-fetched, but be that as it may, sometimes words lodge in our hearts and mind and […]

Least Said, Soonest Mended

Least Said, Soonest Mended

“Least said, soonest mended” is an idiom I think of a lot. It’s useful in many situations. Something is more easily forgotten if it’s not mentioned; feelings are less apt to be hurt if thoughts are kept to oneself; words once spoken can’t be taken back; angry words left unspoken don’t have to be forgiven. […]

Spoken Thoughts

Spoken Thoughts

It’s such an extraordinary thing to hear my own thoughts spoken aloud by someone else! How’d that happen, you may ask? It’s all because of audible books. I love them. My publisher is having the Ned McNeil books put into audible form. All of the four Darcy and Flora books are already available as audibles. […]

Gardyloo and That Means You!

Gardyloo and That Means You!

Words are like people–they have interesting backgrounds. One such word is gardyloo. It originated in France, but was used in other countries too, as a warning that something unsavory was about to happen. What, you may ask? Suppose that you were walking along the street of a European town in the year 1650. Suddenly, from […]