Watch Your Language ... !

They say that language is always evolving, but I'm a little confused as to why the names of towns and cities changes.

I had the TV on the other evening and someone mentioned the town of Warwick, somewhere in New England ... only it was pronounced "war-wick".  The town in England that it was presumably named after, is pronounced "worrick".  Why would it change?  That made me aware of other differences - in the US a town is called "Nor-witch", in the UK, it's "Norridge".  I think I remember someone telling me that the river in New London, Connecticut, is pronounced "Thames" as opposed to the original "Tems" , although they're spelled the same.

So - the mystery continues.  I'm not sure what to search for on the internet to find out why the differences but it would be really interesting to find out.  One more thing to add to my To Do list!  I think I'm safe to assume that the town names were brought over by the pilgrims and other travellers from the United Kingdom and if it's pronounced one way in the Old Country, why would it be changed when they get here?

Who is right? Which side of the Atlantic has evolved the language more than the other?

Is this another case of "The United Kingdom and the United States - two countries divided by a common language."?

The Travel Dilemma ...

When I was in my 20s, I used to travel quite a bit, both the ordinary two-week holiday in the Mediterranean, or something a little more exotic - India, Thailand, or backpacking around Australia. 

Then I got married.  

It's not the fact of being married that has stopped me travelling, but now we have a mortgage and jobs, which means it's not quite so easy to take off for a few weeks or a few months.  My husband, another traveller, would love to spend his time anywhere but, well, working and paying the mortgage!   The main reason, though, is that I'm forty eight hundred miles away from family and old friends, and when we DO have the time and money, we head back to Blighty.  Even then, we rush around the country, visiting parents, siblings and friends, and try to leave some time to have our own mini-adventure as well.  Because of the time constraints, we seem to keep to quick trips to Europe - not a bad thing, trust me - but I lust for far away places.

On my current Bucket List is the Potala Palace, Tibet (China), although I think I'd have to find a time machine before that happens as I'd like to visit it about 50 or so years ago.  The building itself is now a museum, which means the good news is that you can probably see more rooms there than when it was a working Palace.  The bad news is that the city of Lhasa has changed a lot in the past decades as has the whole history of the area.  It's now a UNESCO World Heritage Site - http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/707, which means that, when I DO find the time and money, it should still be there.   I hadn't realized that it consists of the Red Palace, where previous Dalai Lamas are buried,  and the White Palace which is used more for ceremonial occasions.  One day ....

It's a big world out there, and my Bucket List just keeps getting longer. 

Photo Courtesy : http://www.stockfreeimages.com/

Christmas passed ...

A few week's ago I thought our living room was kind of small, then I put up our big Christmas tree, and I REALLY thought the room was small.  Tomorrow ... I know the room will look empty because I'll be taking the tree and decorations down. 

We used to have a 4' fake tree that I put on a table that was covered with a cloth cut to look like icicles.  I'd always wanted a bigger tree but didn't want to pay $200 for one of the really good - fake - trees.  Mooching around Goodwill a couple of weeks before Christmas last year, I found an amazing tree with the mind-blowing price tag of $25.00.  Yes .. it's my $200 tree, I'm sure of it.  It's huge - 6.5 feet high and very full in the nether regions so it certainly takes up a lot of space.  Who cares - it's Christmas, right?  

Going from 4' to 6.5' meant trying not to spend too much money on new ornaments, but I decided to go for the country look as there were a lot of those ornaments at half price!  My incredibly talented sister-in-law, Trudie, made the felt heart.  Heck, she even made the felt!   She pounces on unsuspecting farmers and asks if she can buy newly shorn wool and just goes from there.  I can't wait to see what she sends us each year, all hand made.

So tomorrow, I'll take down the tree, the decorations on the mantlepiece, the cards on the wall, the swag on the stair rail, the Father Christmas on top of the TV cabinet with his snow flakes dangling from the ceiling, and then I'll have a whole year to find some more treasures for my $25.00 tree.