Thing To Do Today: toast!

I spent years wondering how people could drink a toast.

In the end I decided that it was probably something to do with croutons - and then I spent a lot of time worrying about people choking.

Yes, I was a weird kid. But then just look how I grew up...

...hm...possibly best not.

Anyway. It's an odd word, toast. It's one of those words, a contranym, which is its own opposite: the toast of the town is the most cherished and admired person around, but to be toast is to be utterly defeated and quite possibly dead.

Unless you're a pre-recorded track, when toast means to have vocal effects added.

On the other hand if you're toasty then you're pleasantly and happily warm. If you have a toastie then you've got a toasted sandwich.

Hey, but there are worse ways to start the New Year than that.

Cheers and good health!



Thing To Do Today: toast. The heating-things word comes from the Old French toster, from the Latin torrēre, to dry with heat. The drink sort of toast word's first meaning was a lady to whom the company is asked to drink, and comes from the idea that her name would flavour the drink like a piece of spiced toast.

So there we are. A weird kid, yes, but in this case only as weird as the weird weird world.

Which I'd say is ample.