Author Archives: thephraser

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Round two of the word game – it’s getting harder

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“But on the inside there is nothing – only the bare gingerbread walls.

It is not a real house – not until you decide to add a Gingerbread Room.

That’s when the stories can move in.” Vera Nazarian, the Perpetual Calendar of Inspiration

Here is today’s challenge – to make a sentence out of the letters in the words ‘The Gingerbread House’. The order of the words must remain the same as in the name of the item, in this case they would go:

T – H – E   G – I – N – G – E – R – B – R – E – A – D  H – O – U – S – E

These are my two attempts:

“Tea helps everything go in nice, gentle, easy rythyms by restoring energy and dopamine, helping our systems engage.”

“The house entrance goes into nine generously extended, refurbished bedrooms, rather excitingly and daringly haunted on unusually special evenings.”

Hope you might have fun with this.

Copyright Georgie Knaggs & The Phraser 2023

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Here’s a word game as the year ends

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Wreath

Time is proving hard to catch hold of at this time of year, so here’s a plan to help see The Phraser through to the end of its 365 days of blogging.

The idea is that the post on each of the remaining days will be of something related to the season. There will be a photograph with a word beneath it, and the challenge will be to make a sentence using words starting with each of the letters in the name of the item in the image. Today, for example, the image is a wreath – W R E A T H.

Here is a sentence linked to those letters. Hope you might try too, if you have the time. There must be better ideas out there than the one below.

W – Will R – robin – E – eat – A – all – T – the – H – holly

Will robin eat all the holly?

Thanks for reading. Tomorrow the word will be a little trickier.

Copyright Georgie Knaggs & The Phraser 2023

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My last London bus trip for the year

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“The most important reason for going from one place to another is to see what’s in between.” Norton Juster, The Phantom Tolbooth

This bus ride was not long one. It took me from Shoreditch back to St Paul’s. We wound our way past the big-atriumed office blocks, and the pavements filling up with City workers as the light faded into dark.

On this trip it was the vast and sparsely occupied ground floors – the atria – that caught my attention. The reason for these huge, apparently under utilised spaces, has never been clear to me, unless their real purpose is just to let everyone know how important they are.

Anyway, I had a window seat on the top floor of the bus, and was able to admire these entrances from above. In one I saw an Aston Martin racing car looking a little nonplussed at being there, and then, a few doors down, I saw the enormous aquarium in the photograph above. The scale of the aquarium, the blue of it, and the sight of the fish swimming to and fro, took me completely by surprise. It also took the shine off some of the Christmas trees that came next. Some were gleaming in baubles and lights, others were more restrained, and a few even deigned to step outside their buildings to cheer up the passers by. But … however hard the trees tried, they never quite achieved the same splash as the fish, at least not in my list of favourites.

As for any of them noticing us, I don’t think they did. We passed by unremarked. Just another red bus, windows bright and steamy, rumbling on its way.

Copyright Georgie Knaggs & The Phraser 2023