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Sing in English 

Now are you sure it is a good idea?

Happy New Year to everyone!

After a great deal of effort and hair pulling I’ve finally managed to create drag and drop quizzes where the words are dropped into the exact position on a page. This means that in the future I can produce more authentic looking email, fax, letters and phone quizzes……….. all free of charge! 

Take a look at the current new quizzes here: http://www.atlingua.com/student_area/quizindex.php

Don’t forget to let me know what you think of them and remember your suggestions for new quizzes are always welcome!

Enjoy!!

Andy

The Gunpowder Plot of 1605 was a failed attempt by a group of provincial English Catholics to kill King James I of England, his family, and most of the Protestant aristocracy in a single attack by blowing up the Houses of Parliament during the State Opening. The conspirators had then planned to abduct the royal children, (who were Protestant) not present in Parliament, and incite a revolt in the Midlands. 

 The Gunpowder Plot was one of many unsuccessful assasination attempts against James I, led by Guy Fawkes, and followed the Main Plot and Bye Plot of 1603. Some popular historians have put forward a debate about government involvement in the plot. It is still the custom in Britain on, or around, the 5th November to let off fireworks.

Traditionally, in the weeks running up to the 5th, children would make “guys” - effigies supposedly of Fawkes - usually formed from old clothes stuffed with newspaper, and equipped with a grotesque mask, to be burnt on the November 5 bonfire. These effigies would be exhibited in the street to collect money for fireworks. This practice is, however, becoming increasingly rare. The word ‘guy‘ came thus in the 19th century to mean a weirdly dressed person, and hence in the 20th and 21st centuries in the UK and U.S. to mean, in slang usage, any male person.

Happy Bonfire Night!!!

fi yuo cna raed tihs, yuo hvae a sgtrane mnid too

Cna yuo raed tihs? Olny 55 plepoe out of 100 can.
i cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it dseno’t mtaetr in waht oerdr the ltteres in a wrod are, the olny iproamtnt tihng is taht the frsit and lsat ltteers be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it whotuit a pboerlm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Azanmig huh? yaeh and I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt!

If you couldn’t understand the above text then here is the translation into normal English:

If you can read this, you have a strange mind too.
Can you read this? Only 55 people out of 100 can.
I couldn’t believe that I could actually understand what I was reading. The phenomenal power of the human mind, according to research at Cambridge University, it doesn’t matter in what order the letters in a word are, the only important thing is that the first and last letters be in the right place. The rest can be a total mess and you can still read it without a problem. This is because the human mind does not read every letter by itself, but the word as a whole. Amazing huh? Yeah and I always thought spelling was important!
 

Is this possible in Italian also???  

The French will be queing for the Prozac at the chemist’s tomorrow to help them escape the pain of being screwed yet again by the English (they love it really!!). I want to thank Damien Traille (no.15 in the photo below). Apparently he slipped on some brown stuff allowing the English try……… strange, I was aware of plenty of examples in Paris during my time there but I would have thought that Stade de France would be clean!

The Washington Post published a contest for readers in which they were asked
to supply alternate meanings for various words.

The following were some of the winning entries:

Coffee (n.), a person who is coughed upon.

Flabbergasted (adj.), appalled over how much weight you have gained.

Abdicate (v.), to give up all hope of ever having a flat stomach.

Esplanade (v.), to attempt an explanation while drunk.

Willy-nilly (adj.), impotent

Negligent (adj.), describes a condition in which you absentmindedly answer
the door in your nightie.

Lymph (v.), to walk with a lisp.

Gargoyle (n.), an olive-flavored mouthwash.

Flatulence (n.) the emergency vehicle that picks you up after you are run
over by a steamroller.

Balderdash (n.), a rapidly receding hairline.

Testicle (n.), a humorous question on an exam.

Rectitude (n.), the formal, dignified demeanor assumed by a proctologist
immediately before he examines you.

Oyster (n.), a person who sprinkles his conversation with Yiddish
expressions.

Circumvent (n.), the opening in the front of boxer shorts.

Frisbeetarianism (n.), The belief that, when you die, your soul goes up on
the roof and gets stuck there.

Pokemon (n), A Jamaican proctologist.

The Cricket World Cup is being held in the West Indies at the moment. Here is a quick guide for those people who are new to the game:

Cricket is a bat and ball sport played between two teams, usually of eleven players each. A cricket match is played on a grass field (which is usually roughly oval), in the centre of which is a flat strip of ground 22 yards (20.12 m) long, called a pitch. At each end of the pitch is a set of three parallel wooden stakes (known as stumps) driven into the ground, with two small crosspieces (known as bails) laid on top of them. This wooden structure is called a wicket. A player from the fielding team (the bowler) bowls a hard, fist-sized cork-centred leather ball from one wicket towards the other. The ball usually bounces once before reaching a player from the opposing team (the batsman), who defends the wicket from the ball with a wooden cricket bat. The batsman, if he or she does not get out, may then run between the wickets, exchanging ends with the other batsman (the “non-striker”), who has been standing in an inactive role near the bowler’s wicket, to score runs. The other members of the bowler’s team stand in various positions around the field as fielders. The match is won by the team that scores more runs.
 The aim of the batting team is to score as many runs as possible. A run is scored when both batsmen successfully move to their respective opposite ends of the pitch (wicket). (The batsmen will usually only attempt to score runs after the striker has hit the ball, but this is not necessary.) Runs are also scored if the batsman propels the ball to the boundary of the playing area (six runs if the ball reaches the boundary without touching the ground, otherwise four runs), or if the bowler commits some infringement.
 The aim of the bowler’s team is to get each batsman out (this is a wicket, or a dismissal). Dismissals are achieved in a variety of ways. The most direct way is for the bowler to bowl the ball in such a way that it evades the batsman’s guard and hits the stumps, dislodging the bails. While the batsmen are attempting a run, the fielders may attempt to knock the bails off either set of stumps with the ball before the batsman nearer to that set of stumps has reached the crease. Other ways for the fielding side to dismiss a batsman include catching a struck ball before it touches the ground. Once the batsmen are not attempting to score any more runs, the ball is “dead” and is bowled again (each attempt at bowling the ball is a ball or a delivery).
 The game is divided into overs of six (legal) balls. At the end of an over, the batting and bowling ends will be swapped, and the bowler replaced by a member of the fielding side. The two umpires also change positions at this time, and sometimes the fielding positions are rearranged.
  Once out, a batsman is replaced by the next batsman in the team’s lineup. The innings (singular) of the batting team will end when the tenth batsman is given out, since there always must be two batsmen on the field. When this happens, the team is said to be all out. (In limited overs cricket the innings end either when the batting team is all out or the predetermined number of overs are bowled.) At the end of an innings, the two teams exchange roles, the fielding team becoming the batting team and vice versa.
 The team that has scored more runs at the end of the completed match wins. Different varieties of the game have different definitions of “completion”; for instance there may be restrictions on the number of overs, the number of innings, and the number of balls in each innings, etc.Hope that helps!!!