(pen) I have a friend (whom I have seen recently) of 57 years' acquaintance. Is this a greater proportion of my life than 30 years is of yours? Come on, have to hurry you.

Like Rosie I have a friend that I first met at primary school, so that is also 57 years, and I am younger than Rosie.

I am 44 and married the person I sat next to in Infant School.

I seem to have missed the boat a bit, but I've stil created an advert

[FGZ] Hmm. well done on the typography etc, but really, swearing? Do you really need to?

That went over my head I'm afraid.

are sheep for sheep and fish or fishes for fish. Sheeps is only a form of a verb. Sheeps means grazes. Yes, the plural of "whim" is boring old "whims." However,there is "cacti" and "cactuses." Even more fun is that there is "octopi," "octopuses," and "octopodes." More plurals fun: rhinoceroses, rhinoceri, rhinocerotes.

Yes, I'm afraid I also fond FGZstar's poster both meaningless and mildly offensive.
[Plural] I still occasionally come across people who insist "data" can only be a plural. Funny that they don't make the same fuss about "agenda".

[INJ/SM] I presume it was intended as the opposite of the magnificent "Keep Calm and Carry On" posters of the Second World War.

(ISP) I think "data" can be both but I agree that to insist that it is always plural is pretentious and a bit annoying, a bit like government propagandums.
(Phil) Don't quite remember 'em, but if you say so. :-)

[Phil] Thanks. I'm not overly conversant with WWII UK memes unfortunately. In fact, Mr. Chad (known elsewhere as Kilroy) is the sum total of my knowledge of the matter. Or was, since I now know something else thanks to you and FGZStar.

I recognised the reference to 'Keep Calm and Carry On' - available on mugs near you - but still don't see what FGZstar means. I'm happy to accept that it's just a generational thing.

Datum and agendum are singular. One singular piece of data and one singular thing to do, rather than a list. The minute it is two (or more) they become data and agenda. So, "What's on the agenda?" is correct being people are going to expect more than one item. If I say the only thing on the agenda is the meeting, that's wrong, it's the agendum. Yes, I am just being a grammar nazi. I don't really care that much about those words.

I'm trying to do the hidden words thing.

Hidden text

Is this how I hide words?

I figured that out!

Hidden text

I must be smart!

At least, that is not when trying to make text small.

[INJ} I am given to understand by today's youth that "to bail" would indicate giving up in a dramatic way. It would appear to come from "bailing out (of an aeroplane)". Incidentally, "Keep Calm and Carry On" is available on a mug in my own kitchen.

[Kagome...] If you have a lst of things to be done (from the latin gerundive), or an agenda, and it only contains one item, it is still a list of things to be done. So I disagree, and would say that an agenda for a meeting is always an agenda, regardless of how many items are on it. More specifically, each item on an agenda would be an agendum.

[Kag] And you got the singular of Nazi wrong too; it's Nazus. :-)

[Phil] I have it on very good authority that each thing on an agenda is an itum.

[Phil] I have a "Keep Calm and Carry On" t-shirt. frogstar has one that says "Now Panic and Freak Out". To date I don't think we've worn them at the same time.

[KS] A datum is a data point and so is a count noun with a plural of data. However data meaning information is a mass noun and takes a singular agreement.

The whole 'Just Bail' Idea related to something one of the guys I know from my accommodation, who once said 'let's just bail' at a party, and so it stuck, and got written on a large board and put in the window. It was then at a recent poster sale that we saw a 'keep calm' poster, and decided to change it. It was initially going to be 'Just Bail', but this would not fit with the whole idea of an odd number of lines, so the expletive got added. We are now planning on getting the poster printed up at A2 or A1 size, and put on the kitchen wall.

I have now had a tinker with the old photoshop, and have made something else. Hopefully you'll all find this one more to your liking.

Ignore the above. This is actually the link.

[FGZ] You want to put up that helpful new tube map you've been working on...

And I thought that bailing, or bailing out, was a nautical term . . .

So if Obama bailed out the banks, does that mean he dumped all the water out of them?

I believe that in the form stated it is more a metaphor for removing someone from the tender mercies of the law by posting a bond so that they don't have to sit in a cell until they are called to answer for their deeds. Of course, the financial "experts" behind the whole meltdown will never be called to answer for their deeds, so it all metaphorically falls apart. Rather like The Bailout.

This is enlightening: bale or bail

Wouldn't "Bale Out" be some sort of harvest-related activity, possibly taking place in WWII and involving steam tractors and Land Girls?

And I thought it would be taking blocks of hay out of the barn.

The phrase finder site is great! It is often a start for my research on the origins of phrases when I write that type of article, and often quoted as the source as many sources are mentioned on the pages.

I was at Liverpool Street station at the weekend, and was mildly shocked (although not, being me, actually offended) to walk past a (shut) kiosk proudly displaying a greetings card with the message "KEEP CALM AND FUCK OFF" to any and all passers by. I suspect that Mary Whitehouse would not have approved...

[jim] I suspect you are right. Nothing good ever came of telling that lady to keep calm.

Yes, I believe she formed a campaign originally entitled Clean Up National Television.

TLA has just been closed. Any ideas for a new game?

I think that I shall never see
A purple cow that looks like thee
This poem is a pure mess
With lots of apologies to Gilet Burgess.