We’re told that inspiration strikes in unlikely places. So today, while hanging up the washing, came up with a new pun on the former UN Secretary General. I thought it could come in useful for someone who is trying to be very diplomatic, and has big intentions, but is limited to operating in (rural?) Scotland.
Now I’m sure there aren’t lots of occasions where those options combine, although it might have been an option for my grandfather, who came from Skye, and went on to be a diplomat.
I digress. The main thing that came to me, just after feeling smug at this combination, was the sinking feeling that someone, somewhere, must have spotted this, and got there before me, probably while Perez de C himself was still in the job.
This is the trouble. There are all kinds of nice potential titles out there, with wordplay, puns even, and I have the awful suspicion that someone else has got there before me. Perhaps the best option is to keep a list as they occur to me, test them out, and perhaps do a google search to see if anyone else has used the same.
It probably says more about a) the non-phonetic nature of English writing, which allows you to have various phrases that are written differently but sound alike b) the prevalence of puns in British newspaper articles and c) my own fondness for wordplay.
Now all I need is another useful phrase to round off the post, but perhaps I’ll save it for another title…