Halfabet

A semi-literate, a verbose nitwit, from Writer’s Block. Romance language speakers are nothing like as innovative or as welcoming of innovation as the Dutch.

“Spain is full of drunks and drug addicts who don’t want to work”

I was talking last night to a Bangladeshi who worked for a few years as an illegal in London, was deported, came to Spain and used forged papers to obtain residency during the big legalisation programme, and is now waiting out the statutory period to get back to London and restart work there with full…

Love & language

Inés Alegre’s bilingual wedding–all best wishes to her–reminds me that of the suggestion made by some damn atheist separatist the other day that marriages be celebrated in Spanish and divorces in Catalan.

Etymology of assassin, up in smoke

The hash-crazed killer etymology we all know and love is, according to Nouvelle Langue Française (via Langue sauce piquante), a nonsense, invented in 1809 by a dilettante orientalist, Silvestre de Sacy. We should, instead, be looking to the Arabic, assas, guard.