Stephen Fry's programme on language is a blinder. This week's dealt with taboo words, euphemisms* and swearing. Good to know there's lots of scientific evidence that nothing works as well as the 'F' word when you miss the bus, bang your thumb with a hammer and are sick to the back teeth of the petty and not so petty annoyances of everyday life.
Now I know why I get cross when foul mouthed teenage girls are..err..foul mouthed on the bus, when I can swear like a trooper in the staff room. Context is all it seems. Which is probably why my darling still insists in pointing out that swearing doesn't become me after I've downed three glasses of wine on night in the pub with a few friends.
Taboo to you too.
*Still smiling at the extract from 'Round the Horne' where Julian (or was it Sandy?) from the Universal Party ('we come from the left, the right and the centre') delights in 'shaking hands with the honourable member.'
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