Separated by a Common Language

Thought I'd dip into the 'to-be-blogged' e-mailbox and click randomly for the next topic, and wouldn't you know it: the thing I clicked on, a five-month-old note from Jan Freeman, is about off-piste, which I used in the last post, leading to some off-piste (and off-piste) discussion in the comments...

Better Half was listening to a Radio 4 quiz show earlier in which a question was asked about former US vice president Agnew, whose first name, Spiro is from Greek. "Spy-ro Agnew!" I shouted. "Who calls him Spy-ro Agnew?" "I've only ever heard him called that," replied BH. This isn't the first famous...