Dorothy Parker (1893-1967), Alexander Woollcott ((1887-1943) and Robert Benchley (1889-1945) were contemporary, witty writers who wrote famously for the New Yorker, among other outlets, and were the prime knights of the Algonquin Round Table, where they drank (a lot), ate lunch and had great conversations. Add Robert E. Sherwood (1887-1943) to the founding trio. The New Yorker, BTW, first appeared on February 21, 1925, six years before my birth day.

I remember reading an early anecdote about the then struggling magazine: Harold Ross, the New Yorker editor, ran into Dorothy Parker, an early contributor (second issue) on the street and asked her to drop by and write something for the magazine. Parker replied, “I did, but someone was using the pencil.”

I woke up thinking of Robert Benchley, recalling that lovely line, “Get out of your wet coat and into a dry martini”.

Two more famous lines that have never left me are one each by the rest of the triumvirate:

Woollcott: “All the things I like to do are either illegal, immoral, or fattening.”

Parker (asked to use the word horticulture in a sentence): “You can lead a horticulture but you can’t make her think.”

Millennials don’t say things like that.

Obviously I am six decades out of sync.

Well, we don't read the dictionary often enough, anyway. I'm sorry for all that material I dumped on you yesterday but I found out what I wanted to find out and I'll give you my notes now:

surveil as a verb is a new word, originating in the 1960s. I noticed it first in weather foreccasters' vocabulary. It is what is called a back formation, from the noun.

careen/career - note the different definitions. You can tell whether the writer is British (Canadian) or American by the choice of the verb. I notice these things.

oblivious - to, please, not of

both - nowhere is there a construction, "the both of you". So awkward!

deal - similarly, you won't find "big of a" as in "it's not that big of a deal". Why the extra verbiage?

forte - I have my grandfather's pronouncing dictionary which I have always relied on. Forte, the noun, is pronounced FORT.The adjective is FORTAY. Pianoforte (the instrument that plays soft/loud) I think was originally pronounced pianoFORTAY, but I hear only pianoFORT now.

bored - bored with, please, but I have heard bored by. Never bored of. There is a note in the dictionary (see March 20) about the confusion with tired of.

mayonnaise - I putt that in because I sometimes have trouble spelling it, with two esses instead of two enns. The dictionary note says it comes from Mahon, the capital of Minorca - mahon-aise. That's why I want to spell it without the second enn. I read somewhere that the chef of the Duc de Mahon created a new sauce for his master when he ran out of cream. As you know, mayonnaise is made with eggs and oil.

diarrhoea - I put that in because I can't spell it. I always leave out the o.

Enough already.