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Valerie

The A to Z Blog Challenge Theme Reveal

It’s over ten years now since In The Garlic: Your Fun, Informative Guide to Spain was published, a quirky book in A to Z format that distils the essence of Spain, written by myself and my friend and colleague Theresa O’Shea. Critics and readers loved it. And over the years many people have said to me: “you must write a Garlic-style book about Catalonia.” In The Garlic included a number of entries relating to Catalonia,

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March 22, 2017 No Comments
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Valerie

Poach Pod

I’ve been having a massive clearout and, finally, the poach pods have gone for recycling. I bought the set of garish purple silicon egg poachers years ago in the UK. Back then I thought they were a brilliant idea but they turned out to be one of the most useless things I’ve ever had in my kitchen. Because of their shape and the way they sat in the boiling water, it was actually impossible to

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February 27, 2017 9 Comments
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Valerie

Valerie’s A-Z of Bullshit

From Awesome to Zeitgeist, you’ll be blown away by this no-brainer A to Z of buzzwords, hype and cool stuff (originally written and posted in April 2016 for the April A-Z Blogging Challenge). A is for Awesome Please do not send me any more promotional emails that say: “Hi there [user name] I just want you to know you are AWESOME, and to thank you for your AWESOMENESS I’m giving you a gift that will

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January 25, 2017 12 Comments
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Valerie

Brushgasm

So I’m back from digital darkness with a jumble of notes and drafts. I’d lost the thread of this blog – until our cat had a brushgasm. I’m sure you know what that is: a paroxysm of almost unbearable delight at having his coat brushed. The word furgasm also came to mind, immediately followed by purrgasm. Who knows when –gasm was first detached from ‘orgasm’ and tacked on to other words to give us wealthgasms,

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December 10, 2016 3 Comments
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Valerie

Waiting for a Fat Furry Girl

I hesitate to give you this link: you see, it’s a major procrastination tool, which is why I’d carefully deleted it from my bookmarks and my mind. But after a hard day writing workshop content and decluttering my inbox (seriously – I have mails dating back to 2008. I’d have even earlier ones if I hadn’t lost them all in a computer meltdown), I was moved to listen to something upbeat. Namely, Bad Moon Rising

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September 30, 2016 19 Comments
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Valerie

Stainless Steel

So I had the idea of doing a kitchen-themed exploration of my language obsessions. What gadgets or utensils or whatever were worthy of note, linguistically speaking? Stick beater. I like that one.  A beater in the form of a stick. Teardrop grater. This is a box grater with teardrop-shaped holes. Cool. And then… bam! Stainless steel. In Spanish we call it ‘inox’ i.e. acero inoxidable = unrustable steel. Who had the brilliant idea of calling

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September 5, 2016 10 Comments
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Valerie

Birging and Corfing

Who remembers the wonderful game show they used to run on British TV, Call My Bluff? The show featured two teams of awesomely witty celebrity contestants. An obscure word was given:  one team would give three definitions, only one of which was correct, the other two being brilliantly plausible bluffs. The other team had to guess the correct definition. I wonder what they would have done with Birging and Corfing. Birging and corfing are London

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May 16, 2016 6 Comments
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Valerie

Z is for Zeitgeist

This German word is one of my favourites and it means ‘spirit of the age’, which obviously doesn’t sound as streamlined as the German (which translates literally as time-spirit. For cognate lovers, Zeit = tide and Geist = ghost). I don’t personally think zeitgeist is a bullshit word (yet) but what else could we have here? So, I hope you’ve enjoyed this zeitgeist-optimized blog and that it has helped you to repurpose all the no-brainers

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April 30, 2016 2 Comments
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Valerie

Y is for Yettie

You know who they are. They carry black computer bags and they are that particular irritant in airports, spouting into their phones non-stop all the way from baggage drop through boarding, and they can barely be assed to shut up on take-off. And they spout one long stream of bullshit. The Young, Entrepreneurial, Tech-based Twenty-something. The Yettie. Y is also for Yawn.     The A-Z of Bullshit, Hype and Cool Stuff is part of

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April 29, 2016 3 Comments
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Valerie

X is for X-Ray Specs

If this blog had a soundtrack, this song by punk band The Lillingtons would be it: Cause I can see through your bullshit with my X-Ray specs. Well I can see through your bullshit with my X-Ray specs. I can see through your bullshit with my X-Ray specs. I can see through your bullshit with my X-Ray specs, my X-Ray specs, my X-Ray specs,  yeah.   The A-Z of Bullshit, Hype and Cool Stuff is

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April 28, 2016 2 Comments
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