Saturday, December 28, 2013

Subversive, stress and exclamation






































It is possible though not certain that smoking led to  Heidi's  final illness. But the series of smoking pictures which she produced three or four years ago have always been favourites. One hung in the bar of Langan's Brasserie in London for several months encouraged by the then owner Richard Shepherd as a protest against the anti-smoking laws being introduced at the time.Possibly this may upset some people but Heidi was as someone said the other day  nothing if not cheeky.    I know she was having a good laugh.  I don't think that she was setting out to encourage the habit. Nowhere more boldly does her humour shine though.

Although I have a pretty good knowledge of the French language, but clearly I can't speak it. The  other day I use the word atelier which means studio or work shop. I am talking to a French speaker. "What's that?" I pronounce the word a second time  stressing as we do in English the second syllable. "Ah you mean atelier", this time the stress as it should be on the third syllable. I blush.

Always a bit of groaner - groaning seems to give relief - I find myself removing tension or sadness or whatever with a curious expression to which I am not accustomed. "Oh dear me!" I say to myself. "Oh dear me!"


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4 comments:

Lucy said...

- A dear old friend who died a couple of years ago, at a good age it must be said, probably would have got to an even better one if he hadn't shot his liver to bits with shockingly dry Martinis. However, I'm sure that if, at any point in his life, anyone had said he could have had that extra five years without the Martinis he would have declined.

- Blooming French and their blooming last syllable stress. I still find myself thinking, if not saying, 'but that's what I said...' since I'm buggered if I can even detect the difference sometimes.

- Try 'Oh my ears and whiskers!'

Much love.

Stella said...

"Dear me" indeed. You are entitled.
Here, after a seriously disruptive ice storm we have had a melt -- the trees are free of their half inch coating. Pray, no more power outages!

Rouchswalwe said...

Spunky is good! As for French, I turn 'merican and tell them their words should be spelled like they mean business if they expect me to pronounce correctly.

CC said...

Have heard the French seriously mis pronounce
some English word or phrase and struggled to
understand what they're saying….

Not so perfect either!! :~)

OOXXOO