fun with hyphens

filched from the current issue of *New Scientist*, Feedback column:

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HERE'S a reader with an unusual field of interest. Gus McNaughton likes
to read the words at the top of each page in a dictionary - those that
tell you the first and the last words to be found on the page. These
pairings can be quite bizarre, though he says the effect is only
achieved when they are linked by a hyphen. It is lost when, as is more
usual, the words are printed separately.

The most prolific source of interesting pairings is, somewhat to
McNaughton's surprise, the Collins Paperback Spanish Dictionary, which
contains such interesting concepts as "likeable-lingerie",
"hashish-havoc", "thick-skinned-thought", "swimming-trunks-syntax
error", "radioactive-raisin", "quizzical-radio", "body language-booby
trap".

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why this is from the *Spanish* dictionary is something unclear to yr
ailuropod, but the couplings did seem of passing amusement value


manly thats in English not Italiano panda

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