91Èȱ¬

A guide to the words and names in the news from Catherine Sangster of the 91Èȱ¬ Pronunciation Unit.

For defeated centrist candidate Francois Bayrou, the pronunciation is fraa(ng)-SWAA bigh-ROO. Ségolène Royal is say-go-LEN rwaa-YAL - we don't anglicise it to "roy-AL".

For Nicolas Sarkozy we recommend nee-ko-LAA sar-koh-ZEE, preserving stress on the last syllable in line with our usual treatment for French. This surname is pronounced in a variety of ways in France, perhaps because of its Hungarian origins (the Hungarian surname Sárközy is pronounced SHAR-koe-zi - oe as in French "coeur"), but our research suggests that sar-koh-ZEE is the most widespread and most appropriate pronunciation for M Nicolas.

In particular, people we consulted on this particular name in the French Embassy and in 91Èȱ¬'s team of French monitors strongly disliked the "cozy" pronunciation with stress on the middle syllable, even in English-speaking contexts.

(For a guide to our phonetic pronunciations, click here.)

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Snippets from the week's news, sliced, diced and processed for your convenience.

1. Boris Yeltsin lost a thumb and index finger on his left hand while playing with a hand grenade as a child.

2. Runner's World, Wilfred Owen poetry and Uncle Tom's Cabin are restricted in Guantanamo Bay, lawyer Clive Stafford-Smith says.

3. Neighbours is the most watched daytime telly show other than the 91Èȱ¬'s One o'clock news.

4. Scouting for Boys by Lord Baden-Powell is the fourth bestselling book of the 20th Century, after the Bible, the Koran and Mao's Little Red Book.

5. We each get a completely new skeleton every 10 years, because of cell renewal.

6. Smoking will be banned in police interview rooms in England when the new law takes effect, although it is not banned in Scotland.

7. Kryptonite exists.

8. Nearly half of all cases handled by top divorce lawyers last year involved a private detective to check on alleged infidelity.

9. £26m of pennies have been lost on UK streets since 1971.

10. North Korea is the least visited country in the world – only 1,800 Westerners make the trip each year.

Sources: 1 - the Daily Telegraph, 24 April; 2 - the Guardian, 21 April; 4 - the Observer, 22 April; 5 - The Human Footprint, Channel 4; 8 - the Times, 23 April; 9 - the Metro, 23 April;

Seen 10 things? . Thanks to Ian Charnley for this week's picture of 10 pine cones).

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A bumper crop to make up for the non-appearance of Thursday's letters.

Should Britain get rid of the ? Absolutely - and it wouldn't lead to inflation either Gordon. Here in NZ the smallest coin is the 10c and they use the Swedish rounding system. It works best if you are buying multiple items eg: grocery shopping. If the total ends in one, two, three, four or five cents, it gets rounded down. If it's six cents or above it gets rounded up.
Margaret Grant, Christchurch, NZ

Re the lost 1p coins (Wednesday letters). Many are in a jar in my spare room.
Colin, Abingdon. Oxfordshire

Your story on is not entirely correct. Stephen Fry pointed out on QI that children over five can also drink alcohol with a meal served in licensed premises. They just can't buy it themselves.
John Airey, Peterborough, UK

In all the fuss over the slightly foppish A-list star and the beans (Paper Monitor), the role of Tupperware in this unsavoury incident has been entirely overlooked. Isn't it time we had stricter controls on Tupperware sales? A background check, surely, should be an absolute minimum. If a humble bean tub can cause this much trauma, imagine what celebrities armed with salad spinners could do. It hardly bears thinking about.
Chris, Witney, UK

"It is not known where the baked beans came from." Fortnum & Mason?
Kip, Norwich, UK

The chairman of the ICC has declared that the Cricket World Cup . One simple way to make it shorter, which might also be applied to football, would be to terminate the event when England gets eliminated. This would have the added advantage of saving millions of people of other nationalities the tension of having to watch semi-finals or final.
Steve, London

Your diagram used to demonstrate for Professor Hawking's flight seems to me to have the zero-G zone in the wrong place. I would have thought it would occur during the plane's dive. If Professor Hawking is fully recovered from his adventure, maybe he would clarify the issue.
Frank Harrison, Saarland, Germany

Re the and - would it not be fairer to call this an offer rather than a threat?
Sue, London

This Capunorama is a strange chimera indeed.
James, Lancaster

Dear 91Èȱ¬, I am writing to you as I would like to complain in the strongest possible terms. I am not sure what about really... I just felt like a moan. So consider yourself told. I don't expect it to happen again. Honestly, I mean, this is supposed to be the 91Èȱ¬. I expect better from you in the future and I will give you the benefit of the doubt that this was just some temporary glitch.
Christian Cook, Epsom, UK

A man goes to see the doctor, complaining of feeling rundown and unwell. He has a carrot up one nostril and a parsnip up the other. One ear is filled with mashed potato and the other with jelly trifle. "I see the problem." says the Doctor. "You aren't eating properly."
Angus Gafraidh, London

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It's time for the winning entries in our one-off caption competition-Punorama hybrid. A match made in heaven, to be sure.

We asked for your best punning headlines - and your wittiest captions - for these runners dressed up as convicts who completed the London Marathon while shackled together. Their chain-gang - numbering 17 in all - crossed the finish line in five hours and 25 minutes, and set a new world record for the most linked runners to complete a marathon.

Here are the winning captions, with the best puns below.

6. Sue Lee
Lagging behind.

5. Charles, US
Enron company picnic.

4. Rob Outterson
The Australian cricket team model their new one-day kit.

3. Nick Jones
"Yes, I think there may have been a small misunderstanding when I said, 'Shall we go on the run?'"

2. Gareth Jones, Isle of Anglesey
91Èȱ¬ Office's bar-coding prisoners trial criticised as a failure.

1. David Dee
"Tragic! How many did we lose on that zebra crossing?"

And the winning puns:

6. Gaynor
Shackle and run.

5. Murray Milne
Bound on the run.

4. Simon Rooke
A fetters compli.

3. Stig
"Shall we nick the skip, the light, fan, and go?"

2. Helene Parry
The sore shanks contention.

1. Gary Moore
A skip to victory.

Thanks to all who entered. Normal transmission will resume next week.

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A service highlighting the riches of the daily press.

Friday's papers are dominated by the continuing fall-out over an A-list star's contretemps with a photographer in a London street.

Paper Monitor is aware that said star has been arrested and therefore proceedings are active and prejudicing the case must be avoided.

Identity of said star shall not be revealed by Paper Monitor. Suffice it say he might be described as slightly foppish.

In this incident, the Slightly Foppish One (SFO) allegedly lashed out at a member of the esteemed paparazzi allegedly working for the Daily Star who allegedly had the temerity to ask him to smile as he returned to his alleged home.

The SFO allegedly aimed a kick at said member of paparazzi, who tells the paper: "He gave me a couple of kicks in the legs and I think he also kneed me in the groin."

Paper Monitor does not want to jump to conclusions, but there isn't usually any "think" about knee-groin contact. It usually sticks firmly in the mind.

Perhaps the most severe of the allegations is that the SFO threw a plastic tub of baked beans at the photographer. The story even makes the Telegraph, which notes in deadpan fashion: "It is not known where the baked beans came from."

And hey, forget Anya Hindmarch's much-sought-after eco bag, the Daily Mail has created a rival bearing the legend "I'M AN ECO BAG AND PROUD OF IT". You have to collect tokens. Thirty of them to be precise (over the coming weeks). That's an awful lot of trees that will die for the sake of your eco bag.

But the reader's eye is easily drawn to the range of other special offer tokens listed underneath, which appear to be a list of the Mail's favourite editorial topics in free gift form. There's "GIANT REMOTE CONTROL", "DIANA FIGURINE", "£250 OF FAMILY OFFERS" and best of all, "YUMMY MUMMY SILVER BANGLE".

Lovely.

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Yesterday we asked how many mugs of tea were placed in Trafalgar Square on Wednesday to represent the number of cuppas the typical Brit drinks in a lifetime. It's 74,802, which 48% of you answered correctly. Another 43% of you said 52,904 and 9% said 19,331. The tea party was part of Channel 4's promotion of its documentary Human Footprint. Which was lovely. Today's mini-question is on the now.

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A service highlighting the riches of the daily press.

Time to don your body-warmer and stonewash jeans, and stoke up the flux capacitor – Paper Monitor is going back in time. Nothing quiet as ambitious as Marty McFly's journey to the 1950s – today's destination is early 2007; January to be sure, when a national newspaper of tabloid proportions launched upon its unsuspecting public a campaign against excess packaging. And so it seems to be happening again.

"One of the greatest contributors to [the sheer amount of waste generated in modern Britain] is the crazy amount of unnecessary packaging used by supermarkets and manufacturers."

Brrrrrrrrr. Already Paper Monitor is catching a chill and wondering whether it can stick to its three-week-old New Year's resolutions.

But hold on Doc, before we start carbon off-setting our plutonium-powered time machine, could there be a more logical explanation to this apparent time warp? Didn't the Independent run the original campaign? This latest call to ditch the cellophane looks and reads like the Indy's, but above that front page headline reading "NOW IT'S WAR ON PACKAGING" isn't that a Daily Mail masthead?

Ahh, this is what is known as a "homage", and here it is in black and white, the Mail 'fessing up: "In launching our campaign, we duly wish to acknowledge the example set by that paragon of original journalism, the Independent newspaper, which ran its own war on packaging..."

Hold on, was that last bit a dream?

Marty, Marty...

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In Wednesday's Daily Mini-Quiz, we asked what cuisine is served at the UK's second highest ranked restaurant in a list of the world's top 50. The answer is Japanese at Nobu in London, which nearly half of you correctly identified. Today's DMQ is on the .

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Re - I queued this morning, not for a fashion statement but for a reusable bag to use whenever I go shopping, and not just food shopping. My one disappointment was that they were giving the bags to the people buying them in, wait for it... PLASTIC CARRIRER BAGS. Looks like the real message didn't get filtered through to everyone. And, for the record, I refused one, as I usually do.
Hannah, Camberley

If I had a fiver for every time I've said " I don't need a bag, thanks", been completely ignored, and then had to take the goods OUT again... sigh. As for Anya Thingy's effort, my £1 woven plastic basket from a charity shop does very well, thanks. Still, nice idea.
Sue, London

To those who ask why we can't use paper bags, in an environmental case study it was discovered that plastic bags are greener than paper ones. What tipped the balance was the vast amount of bleaching agents used in paper production which is difficult to dispose of and is a high risk water pollutant.
Jamie McNeill, Newcastle Upon Tyne

Re Paper Monitor's comment about Anne Boleyn doing a high five at the news that girls are now the desired gender for new babies. Don't she have six fingers on her hand (thus introducing the very long sleeve to hide the fact, and causing a new fashion statement) - so wouldn't she in fact have done a high six?
Fran, Bucks, UK

Hello. As one of Hugo Rifkind's "underlings" (People Monkey is the preferred moniker) I would love to "do" lunch, as invited by Paper Monitor. Please, get in touch.
Jeremy Austin, Wapping
Monitor note: Our people will call your people.

So, there are 6,500 million 1p coins missing. No! They are down the back of the nations sofas.
Adrian, London, UK

Re : "As the Royal Mint puts the final touches to a re-designed one pence piece..."
For goodness sake, it is a one penny piece - pence is plural!
"I've seen people years ago throwing the old half pence piece away and I think the penny is now viewed the same way."
It is a half-penny piece, not a half-pence piece! Please!
"'We still do a filled sherbet straw that costs a penny but there are fewer and fewer products that are only one pence,' says Andrew Matlow of the town's biggest employer, Swizzels Matlow."
And again! One penny, please, not one pence!
How many more times?
PJ (the pedant), West Yorks, thelbiq.co.uk

Wait! Wasn't yesterday Tuesday - where was the Punorama? How on Earth do you expect me to
a) waste time at work, and
b) humble myself with crushing rejection, if there is no weekly pun contest? I hold you directly responsible for my increased productivity and self-esteem.
Christy, Chicago, US
Monitor note: All is not lost... click here.

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A service highlighting the riches of the daily press.

What a time it's been for Diana conspiracy theorists. Believers in the "establishment plot" line so robustly advocated by Mohammed Al Fayed (and the Daily Express) must have fallen upon the latest plot twist with a resounding "a-HA!"

Can you guess how the Express plays it?
"DIANA: NEW SENSATION. Fury as another inquest coroner quits: Is it just an Establishment fix?" - front page splash
"I see secret hand of the Establishment" - page five

The latter headline is, unsurprisingly, drawn from Mr Al Fayed's response to Baroness Butler-Sloss' decision to step down. And the paper's own verdict on whether this is all part of the suspected plot? Its leader makes no reference to any dark forces that might be at work, but concludes that the resulting delay is "a farce".

Meanwhile, the Daily Mail continues its giveaway of films Paper Monitor has never seen, let alone heard of. Today it's Detective. You know, "Arthur Hailey's Detective" - that's how the Mail sells it. With Hollywood's Tom Berenger. And Annabeth Gish. No?

Paper Monitor is amused to note that among the films in the Mail's "exciting Action Thrillers collection" is A Line in the Sand, starring TV's Ross "hard man" Kemp. Nah, not seen that either...

And in one for Private Eye's Neophiliacs section, the paper's columnist Allison Pearson decrees that "girls are the new boys".

"The quest for a baby girl is one of the secret struggles of our age," Ms Pearson says, perhaps forgetting that each bundle of joy has an almost 50% chance of being a girl anyway. She opines that the former singer formerly known as Posh Spice must be eyeing her goddaughter Bluebell Halliwell jealously now everyone who is anyone is trying for a girl.

She even shoehorns in a reference to Girl Power. Henry VIII must be spinning in his grave (and Anne Boleyn et al doing high fives).

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Yesterday we asked what phrase has become part of Irish drinking slang after Boris Yeltsin failed to get off the plane to meet the prime minister. It's "circling over Shannon", which 45% of you correctly answered. The rest of you opted for "enjoying the trolley" (27%) and "dodging the red carpet" (28%). Apparently the plane had gone round above the airport a few times but Albert Reynolds was still left waiting on the red carpet. Today mini-question is on the now.

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The story is ridiculous. It says: "The new mineral does not contain fluorine (which it does in the film) and is white rather than green but, in all other respects, the chemistry matches that for the rock containing kryptonite." This is like saying: "Oxygen does not contain Hydrogen, and is a gas rather than a liquid but, in all other respects, the chemistry matches that for water."
Andy Nichols, London

Re the discovered under the North Sea. Did the inhabitants blame *that* on Global Warming?
Mike Harper, Devon, UK

Can I flag up a alert on your very own 91Èȱ¬ news site in this story: . It's good to see that porridge is still a ticket to long life and great wealth.
Michael, Washington DC USA

Greetings to the pedants specialised in colloquial French. Re: . He couldn't have found a better place, could he?!
Aurore, Brussels, Belgium

Paper Monitor asks if it's wrong to buy a newspaper solely for the giveaway. Surely if you're doing that, you're buying the item and getting a giveaway newspaper with it?
John R, London

If Paper Monitor were to start giving away freebies, what would he/she give away & how would he/she psychoanalyse the freebie du jour?
Stella Alvarez, oop north

. Does this win a prize for most obvious headline of the week?
Jonathan Riches, Tewkesbury, UK

Inspired by Monday's 25th anniversary of the ZX Spectrum, I felt compelled to write the following Speccy based program...
10 BORDER 0 : PAPER 0 : INK 7 : BRIGHT 1
20 LET i = 0
30 FOR f = 1 TO 24
40 LET i = i + 1
50 IF i = 8 THEN LET i=1
60 INK i
70 PRINT "The Monitor is brilliant!"
80 NEXT f
90 PAUSE 0
Feel free to dust off the 1980s technology and get it working.

Martin, High Wycombe, UK

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A service highlighting the riches of the daily press.

Is it wrong to buy newspapers solely on the basis of what they're giving away with it? Paper Monitor's mind is usually on higher things than mere gewgaws so early in the morning. But it's almost impossible to ignore the current wave of giveaways.

The Daily Telegraph, for instance, is on a Dr Seuss (correct pronunciation here) kick, offering books, CDs, stickers and heaven knows what else. (Signal to readers: You're the kind of folk with children or, more probably, grandchildren and you want to give them generally improving but not stuffy literature. Subtext to those readers: The Daily Telegraph is generally improving but not stuffy.)

The Guardian is offering nicely-produced pamphlets of great speeches from history, with the paper's reports which were originally published at the time of the speech. (Signal to readers: You're the kind of discerning reader with a healthy appetite for pure politics, good on you. Subtext to readers: The Guardian is the "authorised version" of history as it happens.)

The Daily Star is offering free driving lessons. (Signal to readers: Boys, this way. Subtext to readers: This is like Nuts, only every day.)

The Daily Mirror is offering a free Frank Sinatra CD. Plus 10% off clothes at Asda. (Signal to readers: Roll up, roll up. Subtext to readers: Basically we'll do anything.)

Yet it's our old chums the Daily Mail which have really caught the eye. Paper Monitor will be the first to admit that an encyclopedic knowledge of films is not a virtue possessed (that's what is for). But the paper is near the end of a 14-day-long DVD giveaway, and still there hasn't been a film that Paper Monitor has actually heard of, let alone seen.

The criteria for selection appears to be a film which has the kind of name films usually have (eg Reversible Errors, today's disc), but definitely featuring a star/author/direction who you have heard of, allowing some degree of promotion (eg Frederick Forsyth's Icon, The Glory Boys with Rod Steiger, Sam Peckinpah's The Osterman Weekend).

The exception to this was last Wednesday when the paper offered a free DVD of Goldeneye. But it was starring Charles Dance rather than the more conventional option of Pierce Brosnan. Further inquiries made clear that this of course wasn't the world famous film GoldenEye (NB: written with a capital E) in which Bond meets Xenia Onatopp and Sean Bean. No, it was Goldeneye, with no middle capital, which IMDB lists as a "fact-based biography of James Bond author, Ian Fleming".

All these films may well be excellent viewing experiences. In fact as a special feature, anyone who has seen any of the above-mentioned films is hereby invited to add a comment below to fill the rest of us in. But as to what signal the Mail's promotion is sending to its own readers, Paper Monitor has no idea.

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In Monday's Daily Mini-Quiz, we asked what a woman had done to prompt her husband to ring 999, incurring the wrath of the local ambulance service in Reading. You were thoroughly fooled. The answer was she refused to have sex (22%). More than half you thought it was because she hid the remote control. Today's DMQ is on the .

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Re: Sheryl Crow's proposal of a limitation on how many squares of can be used in any one sitting. How much toilet paper is she allowed to use when she talks out of her backside?
Dan Abrey, Oxford, UK

In reference to Sheryl Crowe's advice on limiting ones use of , I've not used any today as I've printed out her blog and used that instead. I'm sure she'll regret her one sheet policy the morning after a curry.
Michael, Leicester, England

Who is Sheryl Crow to tell us how much to use! "One square per restroom visit, except, of course, on those pesky occasions where two to three could be required." I can only assume that the celebrity-worthy toilet paper she buys is a lot thicker / more absorbent than the rest of us are accustomed to. It's probably hand-embroidered as well.
Richard, Basingstoke

Cheryl Crow calls for a limit on use. While I have absolutely no reason to doubt Ms Crow's sincerity, she might perhaps enlighten we breathless minions as to how this particular regulation is to be enforced?
Angus Gafraidh, London UK

Maybe daughter Ireland would have more respect for her father if he had given her a sensible name.
MJ Simpson, Leicester, UK

would be a poor choice for a new Bank Holiday because we already have two in March or April and another two in May. It would be better to have one in the autumn, which needs cheering up -- how about 5 November?
Stephen Turner, Cambridge, England

Regarding average Britons having sex 4,329 times, who among us did the sums to work out if we're above average. I presume this is in a lifetime and not a year otherwise I'm way behind.
K Walker, Runcorn, UK

Over what period of time am I meant to have sex 4,239? I need to know whether I can take it easy for a while, or whether my wife will be thinking of England rather more often than usual.
John Whapshott, Westbury, Wiltshire, England

It's always satisfying when items in 10 Things make some kind of sense with regard to demographic trends. This week, we learn that Brits have sex 4,239 times, though presumably this is falling given the apparent greater attractions of chocolate, which in turn would be consistent with the need for the increase in coffin sizes. Whether or not this has anything to do with termites being cockroaches remains a mystery.
Steve, London

I am proud of your magazine, follow your way.
Haileyesus Teferi, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

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A service highlighting the riches of the daily press.

Fans of Metro (and the Independent) will be well versed in the wraparound cover – a device typically employed by advertisers seeking to lend a little extra oomph to a new product launch or a re-branding. Their impact used to lie in their rarity – although these days hardly a week seems to pass without a mobile phone operator or some such company buying up the front and back pages of a London freebie. (The Indy's penchant for wraparounds tends to be more earnest. While its rivals might devote a full front page to a major story – such as last week's Virginia Tech shootings – that's just a typical day at the Independent, so the wraparound is their way of turning the volume up to 11.)

Seldom, if ever, can Paper Monitor recall the Financial Times resorting to such base populist tactics… until today. The FT has pulled out the stops for a re-launch and in an example of the media's taste for self-reference its wraparound is actually an advertisement for itself, featuring its new tagline "We live in Financial Times". Paper Monitor is a tad confused – shouldn't its front page exclusive be advert enough? No matter.

The wrap in question features a Manhattan-esque vista of skyscrapers verging a waterfront, which, on second glance, reveals itself to be a composite of some of the world's tallest buildings. Subtext: farmers, dry-stone wallers and any other rural types – sling your hook. This paper is for those who stalk the fast lanes of international business. (Evolution rather than revolution - today's re-designed FT (below, right) looks not dissimilar to Fridays (left).)

But there is at least one treat inside. Regular readers of Paper Monitor will know how much it relishes editors writing about their publications (cf and ).

On page two of the wraparound, FT editor Lionel Barber, who, if names alone were ever to determine careers, presumably would be penning 1960s musicals about Dickensian London, provides a set up for the redesign. There's no iPod-style grand plan, as la Ms Sands, but at least one lip-smacking morsel for those who like to graze on amorphous statements about how the changing world affects our news consumption:

"In the late 19th century, the FT became the must-read for Britain's business elite. In the 21st century, we aim to be essential reading for a community of business and political leaders that, while scattered around the planet, is no less tightly knit."

Still reading? "[The new] sharper FT… improved, reorganised and refreshed, it's now even easier to find the information most relevant to you." So where's the sport then? Crammed into half a page towards the back, competing for space with the TV listings. If you want to know the result of yesterday's Aston Villa–Portsmouth tie, you'd best reach for a magnifying glass.

Paper Monitor can't help but think what that parody of modern management, Martin Lukes – whose spoof column weekly in the FT – would make of Mr Barber's musings. For its part, Paper Monitor will simply offer a polite "no comment".

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In Friday's Daily Mini-Quiz, we asked which dance Heather Mills and her partner performed for economy class passengers when the in-flight entertainment had broken. The answer was the foxtrot, which 31% of you correctly identified. Half of you thought it was the tango. Try and do better in today's DMQ, which can be found on the .

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