ANOTHER SKETCH


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Woke

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The English language is forever evolving. It is dynamic and open to change or addition. It always has been and I guess that it always will be. Pick it apart and you will find ingredients from all over the world and from every decade of its long and animated history. In the last one hundred and fifty years, North America with its economic and cultural power has  been an important driver. "Jazz", "cool", "H-bomb", "far out", "mouse"(computer), "shopping mall",  "dude",  "truck",  "candy", "French fries", "hipster" and  "subway" form  just a small sample of American terms that have been absorbed into British English. This morning I was investigating the term "woke" which has become a bit of a buzzword  in the last couple of years even though most native English speakers who are middle-aged or older may have little idea what it means and probably never use i...
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Donovan

صورة
Do you remember Donovan? He is seventy eight years old now and lives in County Cork, Ireland - not far from Dave Northsider - our esteemed blogging colleague. Donovan's full name is Donovan Phillips Leitch and he was born in Glasgow, Scotland though both of his grandmothers were Irish. I must confess that when Donovan broke into the British folk-pop scene in the mid-sixties I was drawn to his music. It was pure, simple and unprocessed, driven principally by the lyrics. His output owed things variously to the hippy movement, to Bob Dylan and to anti-war artists. I saw him in concert three or four times and many years later saw him here in Sheffield. However, it didn't seem as those he had advanced. I even learnt to play several of his songs on my guitar, including the following one which many would argue is his best and best-known song - typical of him in his heyday. Please listen... In the East Yorkshire village where I grew up, my best friend during my teens was a lad ca...
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Plums

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Almost a decade ago I planted a  small plum tree up our garden near the vegetable plot. It is still only a moderate size but in the past ten years the tree has produced many pounds of plums. This late summer is no exception. The variety is prunus domestica 'Victoria'. When left to ripen the plums are plump, juicy and sweet. Only a few of our plums ever seem to get spoilt by creepy crawlies but the other day. after biting into a plum I encountered a small plum-coloured caterpillar waving back at me. I can always tell when we are going to get a good crop. It is all to do with the blossom that appears in April. If the blossom has chance to hang about for a few days in settled, dry and sunny weather then pollinating insects have a chance to do their magical job.  But if the first appearance of the blossom is followed by rain, cold and wind then very little pollination will happen. One summer there were only three or four plums on the tree but this year I would estimate we h...
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