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In this blogposting…
*AGM XXIV
*Things You Didn’t Know You Didn’t Know
*Words Words Words
*One-Liners
*1,001 Buildings: II
Get to it...

AGM XXIV…
...will take place at 1100 next Wednesday 23 February at Oliver’s cafe in Grainger Market, Newcastle.

Naturally, a splendid time is guaranteed for all.

THINGS YOU DIDN’T KNOW YOU DIDN’T KNOW
It’s been quite a while since we had a list of TYDKYDN. So let’s celebrate its return with a particularly glorious list of trivia sent to me by various truckshunters over the last few weeks.
* Mubarak means ‘blessed’ in Arabic – the same as bent means in Danish
* The national currency of Bulgaria is 100 stotinki to the lev
* More than half the world's buffaloes live in India
* Buenos Aires has more psychiatrists per head than any other city in the world
* Francis Henry Egerton, 8th Earl of Bridgewater, gave dinner parties for dogs in Paris
* He also wore each pair of shoes only once then arranged them in rows to measure the passing of time
* An ebberman is defined as 'one who fishes beneath bridges'
* Toast was introduced to Britain in 1661 by Queen Catherine of Braganza, Infanta of Portugal and wife of Charles II
* Hovis was first called Smith's Patent Germ Bread. In 1890 a competition to find a better name was won by Mr Herbert Grime

WORDS WORDS WORDS
Some time ago I asked for your nominations for the most beautiful words in the English language. Peter, from South Shields, has emailed me to point out that American lexicographer Wilfred Funk has already declared these words to be the ten most beautiful…
* chimes
* dawn
* golden
* hush
* lullaby
* luminous
* melody
* mist
* murmuring
* tranquil
… and that, in response, playwright Edward Sheldon declared the ugliest words to be…
* funeral parlour
* galluses
* housewife
* intelligentsia

He also sent me a lovely quote from Emperor Charles V:
‘One should speak Spanish to the gods, Italian to lovers, French to friends, German to soldiers, English to geese and Hungarian to horses’.

ONE-LINERS
Thanks to an otherwise mysterious truckshunter called Tracey who, apropos of nothing, sent me this list of one-liners.
‘Armchair travel is a waste of time; it took me three months just to get up the stairs…’
‘Somewhere between murder and suicide is Merseyside…’
‘I opened a colonic irrigation clinic last month. It was going fine until the hosepipe ban…’
‘I was an accountant from the age of 20 to the age of 30, when I was sacked for no apparent reason. What a waste of 14 years that was…’

1001 BUILDINGS
Here are the next ten buildings that my book says ‘you must see before you die’.
If you’ve seen any of them, please get in touch.
Their timespan is 80AD to 548AD
* The Colosseum, Rome, Italy
* The Pantheon, Rome, Italy
* Castel Sant’Angelo, Rome, Italy (above)
* Hunting Baths, Leptis Magna, Libya
* Arch of Constantine, Rome, Italy
* Church of Santa Costanza, Rome, Italy
* Shaolin Temple, Henan, China
* Haghia Sophia, Istanbul, Turkey
* San Vitale Basilica, Ravenna, Italy
* Church of San Apollinare, Ravenna, Italy

So far, that’s Italy 8, Egypt 4, Ireland 1, Iraq 1, Greece 1, Syria 1, France 1, Libya 1, China 1, Turkey 1

And we’ve got to the first of the 1,001 that I’ve actually seen: Haghia Sophia in Istanbul.

CONTACT ME
Post comments on this blog or email me: truckshunters@googlemail.com