Sideswipe: Foul offering

I'll have the nachos, thanks. Photo / Supplied

Strange News

1) Anyone might find a letter smeared with peanut butter a bit odd, but one woman considered it an assault. She says her husband's ex-wife sent him the letter, and since she's highly allergic to peanuts, she believes it was an attempt to harm her. The oil-soaked envelope had a note on it indicating peanut butter was inside. The ex-wife says she simply wanted to keep the man's new wife from reading mail that was none of her business.
2) A joke Australian TV presenter Karl Stefanovic tried to tell the Dalai Lama fell flat when the religious leader didn't "get it". The Channel Nine presenter asked: "So the Dalai Lama walks into a pizza shop, and says, 'can you make me one with everything?"' The Dalai Lama struggled to understand the idea of pizza and a pizza shop and the punchline left him even more baffled.

Toxic vegetation

An early childhood teacher writes: "A mother came into the centre with a story about her primary school daughter who had come home with a homework assignment the night before. Her daughter wanted to know the name of the plant that was killing everything. Her mother spent quite a while trying to give her the answer. "Wild ginger?" "No." "Gorse?" "Nup, that's not it either ..." After a while, mum finally worked out the answer she was looking for ... the nuclear plant."

Language traps

Commonly misunderstood words

* Enormity - people use it to describe enormousness of size, when it should be used to describe monstrous evil or outrageousness.
* Nonplussed - people use it to describe being not impressed, when it should be used to describe someone who is bewildered or at a complete loss.
* Bemused - people use it to describe being a wee bit amused; it means confused or bewildered.
* Fulsome - people use it to describe glowing or abundant praise, but it means offensively flattering or insincere.

(Source: Grammar.net)

Wrong Indian

"The word Indian (in Indian tonic water) refers to Indian from South America, not the Indian subcontinent," explains Des. "Tonic water contains quinine from cinchona bark, indigenous to the eastern slopes of the Amazonian area of the Andes."

More on metathesis

Alfonso writes: "Ah, metathesis! Try living here in Christchurch with Sumner and Hanmer! If I had a dollar for every time I heard these the wrong way around, I could afford to move out of the former into the latter! "