Dengl 29 MYTE-ology

My wife Bea has bought a book called Green Cleaning - by Margaret Briggs and VIvian Head.

This is very keen on soda bicarb and lemon and one or two other things... I agree - good.

I cant resist quoting from a paragraph:

"Over the years soda and potash were defined as both natural and artificial products and as vegetable and mineral. Imagine playing the old favourite '20 Questions' with the ancestors - it was hard enough trying to define substances as animal,vegetable or mineral as a science game with primary school children, but at least they have a better understanding of materials through the National Curriculum. Another nugget of information that might corner your imagination for a split second: it wasn't until the beginning of the 19th century that Sir Humphrey Davy decomposed both alkalis and called them sodium and potassium, which are really Latinized versions of soda and potash".

No doubt curriculum is a latinised version of something or other in newly nuggetised English - defined to "corner your imagination" (a latinised version of image - and - ation?) - well - only for a split second ...(a latinised version of secondary - as in education - which is itself a latinised version of - eh! an expression of amazement - dook - an expression of social stratification and -tion - (pronounce shun) an expression of dont spend too long with this boring stuff when you can be texting your friends with the whortleberry under the desk ...

... and soon those who have ascended this ladder of knowledge, skill and competence (the National Curriculum of England & Wales?) are going to throw purse power at the university teaching - if and when they arrive to experience it ...

maybe our grandchildren should aim at enrolling in a Scottish or a Chinese University

the book (partly) redeems itself with a proposal for a:

Dry Shampoo
Sprinkle one teaspoon of oatmeal and one of bicarbonate of soda on your head. Massage in for a few minutes*, then comb or brush out. Again, warm air will help to get rid of residue.
(this presumably means wave the electric hair dryer about - one of society's most wasteful devices, I would have thought) ...
(I can see this being marketed as a Fringe Hair experience during the Festival ...)
*the patience required to continue for 5 minutes of this is much more expected than the split seconds available for nuggets inside the skull ...

MYTE is of course Etym backwards, and the ology tacks on for the ride ....