blunder-a-whack (n.) someone whose carelessness has caused a disaster.

One of the best-known examples is that of Catherine O'Leary, whose cow kicked over a lantern she had carelessly placed. The ensuing fire, in Chicago in 1871, killed at least 200 people and destroyed more than 17,000 buildings, leaving more than 100,000 people homeless.

Here is the song many of us would have heard as children at camp:



My much-treasured Christmas present for 2017 is a book by Paul Anthony Jones: "The cabinet of linguistic curiosities". Each page contains a descriptive story about some obscure or archaic word. It occurred to me it would be a fun exercise to try and write, each day, a poem featuring the "word of the day" from the book.

Thanks for reading.

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