And I haven’t even started the Panda book yet

There is a rule in English that you shouldn’t end a sentence with a preposition. For example, “What did you do that for?” is incorrect, because ‘for’ shouldn’t come at the end of a sentence. Here’s a little story that amusingly (if you’re a sad, lonely grammarian) comments on the rule:

A family is planning a move to Australia, a prospect which the young son does not relish. His parents have been telling him all about the country to try to get him excited about the idea, but without success. One evening the father sends his son upstairs to bed, and comes up a moment later with a book about Australia. The irate child sees it and says “What did you bring that book I didn’t want to be read to out of about Down Under up for?”

Winston Churchill is said to have commented on this rule with something like:

“This is the sort of bloody nonsense up with which I will not put.”

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Small World

I was cycling home from work on Friday, and while still around 5 miles from home I got a puncture. No problem, think I, as I whip out my repair kit. That didn’t work (for some reason I always puncture inner tubes on a seam, where patches don’t stick so well), but I carry a spare inner tube as well so I just swapped to that. As I was pumping that up, however, one of my spokes broke, which pretty much put an end to cycling (you can ride with a broken spoke, but it’s not a great idea).

On the walk home, among the many people who stopped to ask if I needed help (score one for my faith in humanity) was a guy I used to work with. Let’s call him Hans, because that’s what his parents called him. He stopped without knowing it was me, which was nice, and we had a bit of a chat. One of the topics covered was weekend activities. I mentioned that I would be rowing, and he said that he knew someone who rowed. After a little back and forth it turned out that his new girlfriend (except-it’s-only-been-a-couple-of-weeks, so-lets-not-get-ahead-of-ourselves) rows in the same program I do, and I’d had an email from her that day. Small world.

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