Hoy!

'Hoy!' is a call for attention, sound made to drive livestock or a way to hail a boat ... apparently.

Personally I'd go for 'Hi' or 'Hello' in the first instance, always used 'cummo-on' to get the cows moving (and was pleased to hear the exact same call used by the people moving these cattle in the Outer Hebrides), and wouldn't be able to resist 'ahoy there' should I ever need to yell at someone on a boat.

Another thing my dictionary claims is that hoy is an Australian game resembling bingo which is played with cards. It's a long time since I played bingo, but I'm fairly sure it doesn't even vaguely resemble cards. Anyway ...

A hoy is a small vessel, usually rigged as a sloop, which carries pasengers or goods for small distances. I can't argue wth that, as I've not yet done sufficient research. Clearly I need another boat trip or two.

Here's a free to enter short story competition with a prize of publication in a glossy magazine and a two night stay in a castle; ideal if you want to get away from the hoi polloi ;-)

Saline

My dictionary gives several complicated definitions of saline, but they all come to pretty much the same thing – has salt (or salts) in it.

The process of making something salty is salinization. The level of saltiness or salinity is measured using a salinometer.

What's your favourite salty thing?

Froward

If a person is froward, then they're perverse or difficult to deal with.

I'll admit that I occasionally act frowardly, but I don't think my overall character displays much forwardness.

The same is mostly true of Jess in my novel Leave Nothing But Footprints, but she does have her moments.

Don't we all?

Corrgible

You've probably come across the word incorrigible, which means a person is unable to be changed, corrected or reformed. It makes perfect sense that corrigible means the opposite of this, but until I spotted it in the dictionary a few moments ago, I hadn't realised corrigible was an actual word.

I've changed since this photo was taken, so I must be corrigible – or at least, I was once!

Vegetal

Vegetal refers to plants, or anything which has the nature of plants, or is vegetative.

Gimmick

A gimmick is a trick or device, used to attract attention, publicity or trade.

Valentine Gimmick is the title of my story in the Valentine's Special issue of Ireland's Own. It's on their website too, so you can read if it you like and find out what Betsie thinks of Valentine's gifts and cards (yes, there could be a clue in the title!)





I've possibly got involved in some gimmickry myself by reducing the price of my short story collection All That Love Stuff to 99p/99c this week.

What do you think – is that a bit gimmicky?

Bosky

Bosky means wooded or bushy. One multistemmed tree would be slightly bosky, a dozen would be boskier and a whole forest is the boskiest of all.

Where's your favourite bosky place?

Thermotaxis

Thermotaxis is the regulation of heat in warm-blooded animals.

When it's hot, I like to cool down in the sea. Does that make me thermotaxic? I'm not a good swimmer, but in the UK that doesn't matter as the sea is generally so cold that a quick paddle is more than enough to do the job.

A thermotactic reaction is movement in a living organism as a response to temperature. If you watch a litter of puppies or piglets, you'll see that if it's warm they spread out more. When the temperature drops, they snuggle up together.

Rebutter

Rebutter, surprisingly isn't something you do to bread when you consider it's not been spread with a liberal enough amount of dairy goodness. 

It's actually a refutation (a word which probably deserves its own WWof theW post) or 'a defendent's reply to the plaintiff's surrejoinder'.



Sometimes I'm no help at all, am I?