Things I learned this month:

Dysarthria is a speech disorder where the muscles required literally won't play ball to help pronounce words.

Stephen Hawking has my favourite kind of sense of humour. The man is one of the most spectacularly intelligent people in history, and quite frankly I'm overawed and a little intimidated by his scary smarts - but he explains things so neatly, never being patronizing and often with light heartedness... I aspire to be that kind of person.

(Page sample snapped from "Universe in a Nutshell")

I discovered an appreciation for associating abstract concepts, such as a how a train and a bicycle, a watch and a ruler, or music and painting are similar... Seems silly, but don't you feel a little bit good for going "Oh yeah, those are examples of..."

Which lead me to discover "neologism"; a new word when you can't grab the one you want. Portmanteaus are "old versions" of neologisms, such as "brunch". Breakfast and Lunch. Or "tellypresser". ;)

Other discoveries included finding out that if His Lordship catches me drinking his tea and goes "Noooooo." in such a way as to make me laugh, I can turn into a tea-geyser. Everything smelled like tea for ages.

And that the Hawaiian lava flats look AMAZING. Oh, and that you can have dinner on them, as my friend Buddhini proved. Lava-grilled sausages. Mmmmm.

Ooh, and check out: http://www.nsf.gov/index.jsp