FLASH MOB

A flash mob (or flashmob) is a large group of people who assemble suddenly in a public place, perform an unusual action for a brief time, then quickly disperse. The term flash mob is generally applied only to gatherings organized via social media  or viral emails, rather than those organized by public relations firms or [...]

To fritter away…

This post has been inspired by one of Juanjo’s photos. You can see them on our Yahoo! page (those of you who are members). He posted a pic of a casino playing table and entitled it “Working Hard”! So I made some witty (?) comment about him “frittering away” his company’s profits. Here’s the meaning explained [...]

A piece of cake…

Obviously, this is a piece of cake, but…
this is NOT what I mean! If we say something “is a piece of cake”, we mean it is easy to do:

Main Entry:
piece of cake

Part of Speech:
noun

Definition:
an easy thing

Synonyms:
 breeze, child’s play, cinch, duck soup, kid stuff, pie, VISUAL THESAURUS

It’s a piece of cake to say thank you with [...]

I screwed up!

Yesterday, 4th February, President Obama said “I’m here on television saying I screwed up.”
The president took responsibility for the biggest nomination failure so far, Tom Daschle’s withdrawal as Health and Human Services nominee, for bungling his taxes.
You can hear Obama saying it in this video (around minute 1′29″)

But what, exactly, does [...]

Baloney…

BALONEY (to listen go to this link)–noun/adjective (noun modifier)
This word is a ‘SLANG’  expression (Slang is the use of highly informal words and expressions that are not considered standard in the speaker’s dialect or language.) meaning ‘nonsense’ or ‘fooloshness’. GOOD SLANG SITE HERE! OR HERE!
It is not so strong as ’shit’,  ’bullshit’ or ‘crap’! (But even [...]

Communifake

Recently, we’ve been looking at compound words and I thought this new coinage would be a good word-of-the-week.
The word is a ‘BLEND’ (like ‘brunch’ =’breakfast + lunch’) which refers to those people who you see walking along the street or in the airport or at meetings, looking important and talking into their mobiles or looking [...]

…from scratch…

To do/start something from scratch. If you do/start something from scratch, you start right at the beginning. It is often used when something you have been doing goes wrong and you have to begin again. 
Eg. We lost all our work in the fire and had to start from scratch.
     When my marriage went wrong, I [...]

To pip someone at the post…

…

pip (someone) at/to the post
Vrb Phrs. To beat someone to the finish and by a small margin. {Informal}

Here’s a schoolboy getting pipped at the post by a friend during a school sports day!

UNSPOILT

    

The most unspoilt land in Britain?

It has long been a well-kept secret haven for walkers – but now Shetland has been named among the world’s top unspoilt island destinations. A new survey of 111 islands across the globe puts the isolated islands in the elite of get-away-from-it-all idylls, and says Shetland’s success has come without [...]

Goody-goody

Meaning (noun): a person who behaves extremely well in order to please a superior and/or in an affected way or smugly  or self-righteousl
Eg. She never does anything naughty; she’s such a goody-goody. (Also – She’s a goody-two shoes)
Synonym: prude (n) prudish (adj)

Possible translation: mosquita muerta, mojigato, santurrón, pequeño santo, angelito
adj. – santurrón, beato
“Goody Goody” is a [...]