Off Topic Language

Off topic, about language. But brief and uncontroversial. I hope...

Deborah: Whoops. Sorry. My fault. Using idiom and feeling like an
idiot - again. When someone a while ago said we should all stick to
standard (American?!) English, I thought quietly to myself (as someone
who loves the weird games and variations people play with the stuff)
how boring it would be to just stick to the basics that we're all more
or less guaranteed to understand. This'll larn me. I promise to (try
to) do better.

As for nap hand. My use of the phrase is a sign of a misspent youth.
It comes from the card game, nap. A winning hand is one which will
take five tricks. Hence 'a nap hand' or 'going nap'  is five of
anything good. In this case, it would be five different plants all
called 'Coppershine.' Now the thing is, I now realise (but didn't
think of it when I first wrote) that I don't know if the game is even
played in America or, if it is, if 'a nap hand' as a phrase has come
to have the same extended meaning. And I should have thought about
that before using it.

So mea culpa. And I won't even THINK about using 'nap' in the
horseracing and gambling sense...!

Let me exculpate my crime by asking a question about a genus and a
particular species within it. Does anyone here grow any Macrozamia spp
- in particular Macrozamia communis? And if so do they have any
notions about hardiness levels, cultural requirements? I'm somehow
acquired (I don't know how it happened, honestly, your honour) not
just one but two of'em and now realise I've no idea what they're going
to do or need. All I know is that whatever they do they do ve-e-e-ery
slowly. And that they're not VERY hardy. But how hardy is not very?

Off to take an embarrassed nap,
Tim 
on the cold but bright and clear Solway Firth, Cumbria, UK
Tim Longville
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