I fear commissar Franco Frattini is not thinking of protecting radical anythingarianism when he proposes introducing self-censorship in Europe. Franco (that man gets everywhere!) has taken this new-old approach to quite an extraordinary degree on his personal site. Dear Boris, Mr Frattini is from the Italian right, friends of freedom indeed…
In Amsterdam Dutch the term boterbrief, “butter-letter”, is used for a marriage licence. In English a bread-and-butter letter is written to thank one’s ex-host (or -spouse, presumably) for that which one has consumed. The former has its origins in the Latin literae butyricae, a permit issued by the church enabling consumption of meat and dairy…
I was cycling to a barrel organ meeting last night when I passed a group of Moroccans, one of whom threw something at me while another shouted “Nigger!” If I’d been slightly more awake, I’d have done a bit of ironic chromatic inversion on Blake.