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‘Normalcy’ is another Americanism when ‘normality’ is what the British tend to use.

My first Saturday job was in Henry’s in Union Street for about 16 shillings. It was 1964 and Cilla Black’s ‘Anyone who had a heart’ was played in the record department in the basement.

Use of a dictionary could sort that one out.

Many words that people say are ‘fillers’ that give the speaker time to think and to fill a gap. eg ‘y’know, like, so, d’you know what I mean’, if you like, I dare say’ all of which carry little or no meaning. There are many more. We tend to notice the phrases or interjections that irritate us...

I think the rising intonation appeared when Neighbours began over here as most Australians seem to end every sentence with a rising intonation making their conversations sound like questions.

Yes, but it is not as irritating as “train station” and getting “there, their and they’re” mixed up or “your and you’re”. We were taught never to start sentences with “and, but or so” because they were conjunctions but that no longer applies. Apparently.

I remember the winter uniform was maroon and grey with a blue badge; the summer one was maroon and blue. Hodge Hill Girls’ Grammar opened the year before BK and had an all blue uniform. Theirs was the colours for Birmingham City Football Club and BK was the colours of Aston Villa FC. I have...

Linda Kinsey and Linda Knight are the only Lindas I remember even though there were several more in the year group.

Linda Kinsey comes to mind.

You have the wrong Vivienne. I am batmadviv not Vivienne14.

There didn’t seem to be a weight problem either. That is probably why most of the fashionable clothes of the day looked good and still do.

Our family moved from Yardley Green Road to Belchers Lane and then to Francis Road. I used to walk along Albert Road to the 14 bus to go to school with Rita Workman and Corinne Campbell from Winstanley Road. Many years later I taught Martin's daughter Samantha and met Martin one parents'...

Snicket and Ginnel are words used in Yorkshire for what we call Alley.

Hi Alan, I remember the Workman family as I was at school with the second daughter. Unfortunately she died a couple of years ago. Regards, batmadviv

I remember Holtom's as a baker's shop. I was at Stechford Primary School just a few yards along the road with the granddaughter of the baker in the 1950s. Happy days. It was such a lovely village in those days. batmadviv

Words go out of fashion if they are not used. Similarly incorrect forms of speech creep in if they are used. Terry Wogan on his Radio 2 morning programme regularly used to highlight 'sat sitting' 'stood standing' with the comment 'What's happening to the English language?' I still say Railway...

I still think of Heartlands Hospital as Little Bromwich Hospital but refer to it as Heartlands as most people would not know it as Little Brom. Is the Hospital in Yardley Green Rd still known as the Chest Hospital or the Fever Hospital or the TB Hospital? In our working class home 'dinner' was...