creepy_shetan: color comic strip header artwork of Snoopy sitting on his doghouse, typing on his typewriter, with a speech bubble containing a red heart in quotation marks (Snoopy // what will you write today?)
[personal profile] creepy_shetan posting in [community profile] comment_fic
[ If you're interested in being a Tuesday-Thursday guest host, you can sign up here. Thanks! ]
↑↑↑ Available dates:
July 29 & 31
August 5 & 7
August 12 & 14


Good time zone, everyone. :3 It's a good day (night?) for a Free for All, don't you think? There are no themes to follow for prompts or fills. If you've had any ideas this week that didn't really work with Tuesday's or Thursday's posts, today's your chance to prompt 'em. Be free, and have fun! ✎

Just a few rules:
1. No more than five prompts in a row.
2. No more than three prompts in the same fandom.
3. Use the character's full name and the fandom's full name for ease in adding to the Lonely Prompts spreadsheet.
4. No spoilers in prompts for a month after airing, or use the spoiler cut option found here. Unfortunately, DW doesn’t have a cut tag, so use your best judgment when it comes to spoilers.
5. If your fill contains spoilers, warn and leave plenty of space, or use the spoiler cut.
6. If your story has possible triggers, please warn for them in the subject line!

Prompts should be formatted as follows: [Use the character's full names and fandom's full name]
Fandom, Character +/ Character, Prompt

Are today's prompts not catching your eye? No worries, because we have plenty of older prompts that just might do the trick! You can browse through the comm's calendar archive (here on LJ or here on DW) for themed and Free For All posts, or perhaps check out Sunday posts for Lonely Prompt requests. (Or, you can be like me, and try to save interesting prompts as you see 'em... and then end up with multiple text doc files full of [themes + links + prompts] that you can easily look through and search for keywords.) Multiple fills for one prompt are welcome, by the way! Oh, and you are very likely to find some awesome fills to read as well, and wouldn't it be nice to leave a comment on those lovely little writing distractions? ~_^

We are on AO3! If you fill a prompt and post it to AO3, please add it to the Bite Sized Bits of Fic from 2025 collection.

If you are viewing this post on our Dreamwidth site: please know that fills posted here will not show up as comments on our LiveJournal site, but you are still more than welcome to participate. =)

If you have a Dreamwidth account and would feel more comfortable participating there, please feel free to do so… and spread the word! [community profile] comment_fic


A friendly reminder about our posting schedule: Themed posts for new prompts go up on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Saturdays are a Free for All day for new prompts of any flavor. Sundays are for showing Lonely Prompts some love, whether by requesting for someone to adopt them or by sharing any fills that you've recently completed.

[ SECRET POST #6762 ]

Jul. 11th, 2025 07:22 pm
case: (Default)
[personal profile] case posting in [community profile] fandomsecrets

⌈ Secret Post #6762 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.


01.


More! )


Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 00 pages, 00 secrets from Secret Submission Post #965.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Check-In Post - July 11th 2025

Jul. 11th, 2025 07:20 pm
badly_knitted: (Get Knitted)
[personal profile] badly_knitted posting in [community profile] get_knitted

Hello to all members, passers-by, curious onlookers, and shy lurkers, and welcome to our regular daily check-in post. Just leave a comment below to let us know how your current projects are progressing, or even if they're not.

Checking in is NOT compulsory, check in as often or as seldom as you want, this community isn't about pressure it's about encouragement, motivation, and support. Crafting is meant to be fun, and what's more fun than sharing achievements and seeing the wonderful things everyone else is creating?

There may also occasionally be questions, but again you don't have to answer them, they're just a way of getting to know each other a bit better.


This Week's Question: What do you like to listen to / watch while crafting?


If anyone has any questions of their own about the community, or suggestions for tags, questions to be asked on the check-in posts, or if anyone is interested in playing check-in host for a week here on the community, which would entail putting up the daily check-in posts and responding to comments, go to the Questions & Suggestions post and leave a comment.

I now declare this Check-In OPEN!



[ SECRET POST #6761 ]

Jul. 10th, 2025 06:12 pm
case: (Default)
[personal profile] case posting in [community profile] fandomsecrets

⌈ Secret Post #6761 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.


01.


More! )


Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 01 pages, 06 secrets from Secret Submission Post #965.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Thursday: Desserts

Jul. 10th, 2025 04:21 pm
templefugate: Icon of Wanda Maximoff from The Children's Crusade (Wanda)
[personal profile] templefugate posting in [community profile] comment_fic
Sorry for the late post, but a family emergency has eaten up (no pun intended) most of my day. I’m templefugate, and I'm your host this week. As a reminder, we are using a new posting schedule. Sundays are for Lonely Prompts and sharing the fills that you completed during the week, Tuesdays and Thursdays are for new themes and prompts, and Saturdays will remain a Free for All.

Today's theme is dessert. Prompts should have anything to do with the best kinds of food, be they sweet or otherwise.

Just a few rules:
No more than five prompts in a row.
No more than three prompts in the same fandom.
Use the character's full names and the fandom's full name
No spoilers in prompts for a month after airing, or use the spoiler cut option found here.
If your fill contains spoilers, warn and leave plenty of space, or use the above-mentioned spoiler cut.

Prompts should be formatted as follows: [Use the character's full names and fandom's full name]
Fandom, Character +/ Character, Prompt

Some examples to get the ball rolling...
+ The Hobbit, Bilbo Baggins/Thorin Oakenshield, hobbit food has caused Thorin to get pudgier since moving to the Shire to live with Bilbo
+ Any, any, fighting over whether sour or sweet gummy worms taste better
+ Any, any, just desserts

We are now using AO3 to bookmark filled prompts. If you fill a prompt and post it to AO3 please add it to the Bite Sized Bits of Fic from 2025 collection. See further notes on this new option here.

Not feeling any of today’s prompts? You can use LJ’s advanced search options to limit keyword results to only comments in this community.

While the use of LJ's advanced search options is available, bookmarking the links of prompts you like might work better for searching in the future.

If you are viewing this post on our Dreamwidth site, please know that fills posted here will not show up as comments on our LiveJournal site but you are still more than welcome to participate.

If you have a Dreamwidth account and would feel more comfortable participating there, please feel free to do so…and spread the word! [community profile] comment_fic



tag=desserts

Check-In Post - July 10th 2025

Jul. 10th, 2025 07:19 pm
badly_knitted: (Get Knitted)
[personal profile] badly_knitted posting in [community profile] get_knitted

Hello to all members, passers-by, curious onlookers, and shy lurkers, and welcome to our regular daily check-in post. Just leave a comment below to let us know how your current projects are progressing, or even if they're not.

Checking in is NOT compulsory, check in as often or as seldom as you want, this community isn't about pressure it's about encouragement, motivation, and support. Crafting is meant to be fun, and what's more fun than sharing achievements and seeing the wonderful things everyone else is creating?

There may also occasionally be questions, but again you don't have to answer them, they're just a way of getting to know each other a bit better.


This Week's Question: What do you like to listen to / watch while crafting?


If anyone has any questions of their own about the community, or suggestions for tags, questions to be asked on the check-in posts, or if anyone is interested in playing check-in host for a week here on the community, which would entail putting up the daily check-in posts and responding to comments, go to the Questions & Suggestions post and leave a comment.

I now declare this Check-In OPEN!



[ SECRET POST #6760 ]

Jul. 9th, 2025 04:29 pm
case: (Default)
[personal profile] case posting in [community profile] fandomsecrets

⌈ Secret Post #6760 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.


01.


More! )


Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 01 pages, 12 secrets from Secret Submission Post #965.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Check-In Post - July 9th 2025

Jul. 9th, 2025 08:04 pm
badly_knitted: (Get Knitted)
[personal profile] badly_knitted posting in [community profile] get_knitted

Hello to all members, passers-by, curious onlookers, and shy lurkers, and welcome to our regular daily check-in post. Just leave a comment below to let us know how your current projects are progressing, or even if they're not.

Checking in is NOT compulsory, check in as often or as seldom as you want, this community isn't about pressure it's about encouragement, motivation, and support. Crafting is meant to be fun, and what's more fun than sharing achievements and seeing the wonderful things everyone else is creating?

There may also occasionally be questions, but again you don't have to answer them, they're just a way of getting to know each other a bit better.


This Week's Question: What do you like to listen to / watch while crafting?


If anyone has any questions of their own about the community, or suggestions for tags, questions to be asked on the check-in posts, or if anyone is interested in playing check-in host for a week here on the community, which would entail putting up the daily check-in posts and responding to comments, go to the Questions & Suggestions post and leave a comment.

I now declare this Check-In OPEN!



Wednesday Word: Bingsu

Jul. 9th, 2025 09:13 am
calzephyr: Scott Pilgrim generator (Default)
[personal profile] calzephyr posting in [community profile] 1word1day
Bingsu - noun.

Sometimes spelled bingsoo</>, bingsu is a Korean shaved ice dessert, sometimes topped with red beans, fruit syrup or condensed milk.

The dessert's origins date back to 400BC!


Patbingsu.jpg
By 국립국어원, CC BY-SA 2.0 kr, Link


[ SECRET POST #6759 ]

Jul. 8th, 2025 08:05 pm
case: (Default)
[personal profile] case posting in [community profile] fandomsecrets

⌈ Secret Post #6759 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.


01.


More! )


Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 01 pages, 18 secrets from Secret Submission Post #965.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Check-In Post - July 8th 2025

Jul. 8th, 2025 07:49 pm
badly_knitted: (Get Knitted)
[personal profile] badly_knitted posting in [community profile] get_knitted

Hello to all members, passers-by, curious onlookers, and shy lurkers, and welcome to our regular daily check-in post. Just leave a comment below to let us know how your current projects are progressing, or even if they're not.

Checking in is NOT compulsory, check in as often or as seldom as you want, this community isn't about pressure it's about encouragement, motivation, and support. Crafting is meant to be fun, and what's more fun than sharing achievements and seeing the wonderful things everyone else is creating?

There may also occasionally be questions, but again you don't have to answer them, they're just a way of getting to know each other a bit better.


This Week's Question: What do you like to listen to / watch while crafting?


If anyone has any questions of their own about the community, or suggestions for tags, questions to be asked on the check-in posts, or if anyone is interested in playing check-in host for a week here on the community, which would entail putting up the daily check-in posts and responding to comments, go to the Questions & Suggestions post and leave a comment.

I now declare this Check-In OPEN!



Tuesday word: Carillon

Jul. 8th, 2025 09:58 am
simplyn2deep: (NWABT::Scott::hoodie)
[personal profile] simplyn2deep posting in [community profile] 1word1day
Tuesday, July 8, 2025

Carillon (noun)
carillon [kar-uh-lon, -luhn, kuh-ril-yuhn]


noun
1. a set of stationary bells hung in a tower and sounded by manual or pedal action, or by machinery.
2. a set of horizontal metal plates, struck by hammers, used in the modern orchestra.

See more synonyms on Thesaurus.com

Origin: 1765–75; < French: set of bells, Old French car ( e ) ignon, quarregnon < Vulgar Latin *quadriniōn-, re-formation of Late Latin quaterniōn- quaternion; presumably originally a set of four bells

Example Sentences
At noon on Tuesday, some church bells and carillons in the Netherlands didn’t sound like they usually do.
From New York Times

Charles Semowich, who plays the carillon inside the 392-foot tower at Riverside Church, said he hears occasional screeching outside his window.
From Seattle Times

Artists can take over and “play” billboards and the chapel like a carillonneur playing a carillon.
From New York Times

The final gesture comes as a surprise: a sudden, brilliant cascade from opposite ends of the keyboard toward the center, a carillon from the beyond.
From New York Times

The carillon isn’t just a workout for the legs.
From Washington Post

Now YOU come up with a sentence (or fic? or graphic?) that best illustrates the word.

Tuesday: Meat

Jul. 8th, 2025 12:15 am
templefugate: Bladecraft Orianna's splash art from League of Legends (Bladecraft_Orianna)
[personal profile] templefugate posting in [community profile] comment_fic
Hi, everyone! I’m templefugate, and I'm your host this week. As a reminder, we are using a new posting schedule. Sundays are for Lonely Prompts and sharing the fills that you completed during the week, Tuesdays and Thursdays are for new themes and prompts, and Saturdays will remain a Free for All.

Today's theme is meat, the most controversial yet often most enticing food type. Prompts should have something to do with meat, be it the usual chicken, pork, beef, and fish varieties or something more exotic and/or fantastical.

Just a few rules:
No more than five prompts in a row.
No more than three prompts in the same fandom.
Use the character's full names and the fandom's full name
No spoilers in prompts for a month after airing, or use the spoiler cut option found here.
If your fill contains spoilers, warn and leave plenty of space, or use the above-mentioned spoiler cut.

Prompts should be formatted as follows: [Use the character's full names and fandom's full name]
Fandom, Character +/ Character, Prompt

Some examples to get the ball rolling...
+ Tolkien, any, orc meat
+ Teen Titans, Beast Boy, trying Beyond foods (cheeseburgers, steak, etc.)
+ Any, any, survival cannibalism

We are now using AO3 to bookmark filled prompts. If you fill a prompt and post it to AO3 please add it to the Bite Sized Bits of Fic from 2025 collection. See further notes on this new option here.

Not feeling any of today’s prompts? You can use LJ’s advanced search options to limit keyword results to only comments in this community.

While the use of LJ's advanced search options is available, bookmarking the links of prompts you like might work better for searching in the future.

If you are viewing this post on our Dreamwidth site, please know that fills posted here will not show up as comments on our LiveJournal site but you are still more than welcome to participate.

If you have a Dreamwidth account and would feel more comfortable participating there, please feel free to do so…and spread the word! [community profile] comment_fic



tag=meat

Monday Word: Panoply

Jul. 7th, 2025 04:27 pm
stonepicnicking_okapi: letters (letters)
[personal profile] stonepicnicking_okapi posting in [community profile] 1word1day
panoply

noun

[pan-uh-plee]

1. a wide-ranging and impressive array or display.
2. the dazzling panoply of the maharaja's procession; the panoply of European history.
3. a complete suit of armor.
4. a protective covering.
5. full ceremonial attire or paraphernalia; special dress and equipment.

examples

The fair also boasts a panoply of food mixing ingredients in interesting and strange ways.
—Chase Hunter, Mercury News, 16 June 2025

Costume designer Lindsay Pugh creates a panoply of Viking garb that balances its intricate historical detail with a healthy dollop of whimsy.
—Maureen Lee Lenker, EW.com, 10 June 2025

The 2025 Cannes Film Festival has so far brought a panoply of movies for critics, audiences, and potential buyers to check out.
—Anne Thompson, IndieWire, 20 May 2025

origin

Panoply comes from the Greek word panoplia, which referred to the full suit of armor worn by hoplites, heavily armed infantry soldiers of ancient Greece. Panoplia is a blend of the prefix pan-, meaning “all,” and hopla, meaning “arms” or “armor.”

panoply

[ SECRET POST #6758 ]

Jul. 7th, 2025 04:40 pm
case: (Default)
[personal profile] case posting in [community profile] fandomsecrets

⌈ Secret Post #6758 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.


01.


More! )


Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 01 pages, 24 secrets from Secret Submission Post #965.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Check-In Post - July 7th 2025

Jul. 7th, 2025 07:28 pm
badly_knitted: (Get Knitted)
[personal profile] badly_knitted posting in [community profile] get_knitted

Hello to all members, passers-by, curious onlookers, and shy lurkers, and welcome to our regular daily check-in post. Just leave a comment below to let us know how your current projects are progressing, or even if they're not.

Checking in is NOT compulsory, check in as often or as seldom as you want, this community isn't about pressure it's about encouragement, motivation, and support. Crafting is meant to be fun, and what's more fun than sharing achievements and seeing the wonderful things everyone else is creating?

There may also occasionally be questions, but again you don't have to answer them, they're just a way of getting to know each other a bit better.


This Week's Question: What do you like to listen to / watch while crafting?


If anyone has any questions of their own about the community, or suggestions for tags, questions to be asked on the check-in posts, or if anyone is interested in playing check-in host for a week here on the community, which would entail putting up the daily check-in posts and responding to comments, go to the Questions & Suggestions post and leave a comment.

I now declare this Check-In OPEN!



Check-In Post - July 6th 2025

Jul. 6th, 2025 07:39 pm
badly_knitted: (Get Knitted)
[personal profile] badly_knitted posting in [community profile] get_knitted

Hello to all members, passers-by, curious onlookers, and shy lurkers, and welcome to our regular daily check-in post. Just leave a comment below to let us know how your current projects are progressing, or even if they're not.

Checking in is NOT compulsory, check in as often or as seldom as you want, this community isn't about pressure it's about encouragement, motivation, and support. Crafting is meant to be fun, and what's more fun than sharing achievements and seeing the wonderful things everyone else is creating?

There may also occasionally be questions, but again you don't have to answer them, they're just a way of getting to know each other a bit better.


This Week's Question: What do you like to listen to / watch while crafting?


If anyone has any questions of their own about the community, or suggestions for tags, questions to be asked on the check-in posts, or if anyone is interested in playing check-in host for a week here on the community, which would entail putting up the daily check-in posts and responding to comments, go to the Questions & Suggestions post and leave a comment.

I now declare this Check-In OPEN!



[ SECRET POST #6757 ]

Jul. 6th, 2025 02:09 pm
case: (Default)
[personal profile] case posting in [community profile] fandomsecrets

⌈ Secret Post #6757 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.


01.


More! )


Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 30 secrets from Secret Submission Post #965.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.
creepy_shetan: two shots of Cillian Murphy taken in 2007, one of him looking through the viewfinder of an old film camera, one of him with the camera down (Cillian Murphy // memories & photographs)
[personal profile] creepy_shetan posting in [community profile] comment_fic
[ If you're interested in being a Tuesday-Thursday guest host, you can sign up here. Thanks! ❤ ]
↑↑↑ Available dates:
July 22 & 24
July 29 & 31
August 5 & 7


Hi, everyone! :3 Welcome to this week's Lonely Prompts adoption day. If this is your first time at [community profile] comment_fic on a Sunday, you can either request previous prompts to be filled or share your recent fills for prompts. (Or do both, of course!) ✎

How to look for prompts:
We have plenty of prompts that might just nibble away at your brain today. You can browse through the comm's calendar archive (here on LJ or here on DW) for themed and Free For All posts, or perhaps check out Sunday posts for Lonely Prompt requests. (Or, you can be like me, and try to save interesting prompts as you see 'em... and then end up with multiple text doc files full of [themes + links + prompts] that you can easily look through and search for keywords.) Multiple fills for one prompt are welcome, by the way! Oh, and you are very likely to find some awesome fills to read as well, and wouldn't it be nice to leave a comment on those lovely little writing distractions? ~_^

Whichever you decide to do, prompt or fill (or both), please remember:
1. You can only request five prompts to be filled.
2. You can request no more than three prompts from a particular fandom.
3. You can, however, fill as many prompts in as many fandoms as you'd like!
4. In the subject line, be sure to say whether it is a request or a fill!
5. You must link back to wherever the prompt is in the community archive (whether filling or requesting), and, if you're filling the prompt, please post the fill as a reply to the original prompt.
6. If you are filling an "any/any" prompt, please let us know what fandom you've written it for (or if it's original!).
8. If there are possible triggers in your story, please warn for them in the subject line!
7. If you've filled any lonely prompts in the past week, this is the place to share them!
9. Finally, please remember to add your prompt fills to our AO3 collection: Bite Sized Bits of Fic from 2024 collection. See further notes on this option here.

How to link:
[a href="http://comment-fic.livejournal.com/449155.html?thread=70682755#t70682755">MCU, Tony Stark/Pepper Potts, She's wearing daisy dukes and one of his button-down shirts.[/a]
(change the brackets to "<" and ">" respectively)
or:
http://comment-fic.livejournal.com/139897.html?thread=30155641#t30155641
Burn Notice, Sam/Michael/Fi, "It's always been you. And it's always gonna be you."

We are on AO3! If you fill a prompt and post it to AO3, please add it to the Bite Sized Bits of Fic from 2025 collection.

If you are viewing this post on our Dreamwidth site: please know that fills posted here will not show up as comments on our LiveJournal site, but you are still more than welcome to participate. =)

If you have a Dreamwidth account and would feel more comfortable participating there, please feel free to do so… and spread the word! [community profile] comment_fic


A friendly reminder about our posting schedule: Themed posts for new prompts go up on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Saturdays are a Free for All day for new prompts of any flavor. Sundays are for showing Lonely Prompts some love, whether by requesting for someone to adopt them or by sharing any fills that you've recently completed.

Sunday Word: Mangel-wurzel

Jul. 6th, 2025 04:42 pm
sallymn: (words 6)
[personal profile] sallymn posting in [community profile] 1word1day

mangel-wurzel [mang-guhl-wur-zuhl]

noun:
(chiefly British) a variety of the beet Beta vulgaris, cultivated as food for livestock.


(click to enlarge)

Examples:

The village's Punkie Night takes place on the last Thursday in October. Children carry "punkies" - lanterns traditionally made from a large turnip known as a mangel-wurzel - and stop at key locations to sing the Punkie Song. (Linda Serck, Halloween: England's strange and ancient winter rituals, BBC, October 2014)

Teams of three compete to see who can land their mangel-wurzel nearest a large, leafless one, called a 'Norman'. (So wurzel our mangels gone?, Express, October, 2012)

We feel inclined to embrace Mr Hardy, though we are not fond of him, in pure satisfaction with the good brown soil and substantial flesh and blood, the cows, and the mangel-wurzel, and the hard labour of the fields - which he makes us smell and see. (Joanne Wilkes (ed), Literary and Cultural Criticism from the Nineteenth Century)

He soon discovers that the melon has no more flavor than a mangel-wurzel, and that the apricot tastes like a turnip radish. (Charles James Lever, The Dodd Family Abroad)

She turned to Philip. "Athelny's always like this when we come down here. Country, I like that! Why, he don't know a swede from a mangel-wurzel." (Somerset Maugham, Of Human Bondage)

His mouth is open, too, and big enough apparently to hold a mangel-wurzel. ( Gordon Stables, The Cruise of the Land-Yacht 'Wanderer'; or, Thirteen Hundred Miles in my Caravan)

Origin:

Root vegetables aren't the most sexy things either to eat or write about but I hope to show that this one's an exception. Let's get a couple of important things right before we go any further - its name is usually written mangel-wurzel and it isn't a relative of the turnip but a large variety of beet, closely related to the sugar beet and the beetroot or red beet.

Mind you, many people have been confused about it down the years. These root vegetables all look alike to the non-specialist and we don't even all have the same names for them. The British swede is the rutabaga in the US, for example, the latter name having been taken from an old dialect Swedish word for this type of turnip. (Brits call it a swede because it was bred in Sweden in the eighteenth century; the Scots name for it is neep, as in bashed neeps, or mashed turnips, a traditional accompaniment to the famous haggis). But when H L Mencken wrote in The American Language in 1921 that Englishmen 'still call the rutabaga a mangelwurzel', he was seriously up the botanical and agricultural creek without a leg to stand on.

Mangel-wurzel is mainly a British term, which is often shortened to mangel, or sometimes to mangold. To many townies, it evokes a stereotyped traditional yokel rurality in which every peasant wears a smock, wields a pitchfork, and talks in a Mummerset accent. Think of the scarecrow Worzel Gummidge, whose first name comes from the vegetable, though the author states that his head was actually made from a turnip. Confusion abounds.

Mangel-wurzel is originally German. The first part is the old word Mangold, meaning beet or chard (the latter being the green leaves from a variety of beet). The second part is Wurzel, a root. Germans became confused about the first part several centuries ago and thought it was instead Mangel, a shortage or lack. From this has grown up the popular belief that mangel-wurzel refers to a famine food, a root you eat only when you're starving. This is a gross calumny, since when young it's as tasty and sweet as other sorts of beet, though it's mainly used as animal fodder. (World Wide Words)

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