20 November 2012

gnomophobia

[nohm-oh-foh-bee-uh] (homonym of yesterday’s word of the day: nomophobia)

noun

– irrational fear of garden gnomes.

Example:

‘We stole a garden gnome and set it on the front step of the neighbour’s house and then knocked on the door. It was hilarious hearing him scream when he opened the door and saw the gnome. Even funnier was watching him go foetal as the gnome stood there taunting his gnomophobia’.

Today’s aphorism

‘He never chooses an opinion; he just wears whatever happens to be in style’.

– Leo Tolstoy

On this day

20 November 1910 – death of Leo Tolstoy, Russian writer, (‘Anna Karenina‘, ‘War and Peace‘). Born 9 September 1828.

20 November 1947 – Princess Elizabeth, who is crowned Queen Elizabeth II in 1952, marries Phillip Mountbatten in Westminster Abbey.

20 November 1985 – Microsoft launches Windows 1.01, a graphical user interface for personal computers. The program required MS-DOS to operate.