I was disappointed, and I guess some of you were too about the brevity of the footnote in one of my recent articles.

The footnote, in its entirety, was "sic is Latin for thus" and it appeared in the article entitled: A word now about Des O'Connor.

This was due to one of those errors that even the best of us make sometimes. When I had written the article originally I had placed an asterisk in the main body of the text and had then failed to write the actual footnote. So when it came to webification* and uploading I suddenly noticed the error and had to come up with something quick. So I went for the barest sense of what I had intended writing.** It was the last of a large batch of articles I was tired and, I'm sorry to say, I rushed it.

But this leads me to the topic of footnotes. So much of the text on www.gamboling.co.uk is stream of consciousness that it seems odd that the footnotes are not. Or rather they are but they are more of an ox-bow lake.*** Because although, I assume, that most readers read along until they come to a footnote then read the footnote and then come back to the main text I don't write the article like that. I write the body and then the footnotes. And that can get me into trouble because there is an interesting (sic)**** debate about the order that footnotes go in when footnotes are called from within footnotes. Because in theory they should be number in order that the reader reads them. But in practice they are most usually written in the order that they appear on the page. Isn't that dull?

* "webification" is not yet a currently acceptable word to bandy about. However the word "webify" is just about becoming so and means "to turn into html compatible format". With "webification" I am pre-empting a part of speech which may become useful once "webify" is accepted.

** What had I intended writing? You may well ask. Unfortunately I can't really remember, which is why I had to make something up****

*** Ox-bow lakes are the bits of river that rivers leave behind when their courses change. Usually because of a change in strength some distance away

**** I know what you're thinking "Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha!"******

***** If I had to make something up now I would mention for an absolute start that it can be used in two ways which lots of people seem to miss in their definitions. The most traditional way is when you are quoting somebody but you want to make abundantly clear that it was them who made the mistake not you while you were copying it. The second use is as a joke, which is how I used it. To question the title that Des O'Connor had been given by the press, they said he was an "entertainer".

****** But in a way where all the "Ha!"'s are sarcastic*******

******* Something that annoys me is the hypocritical groan though. You tell a joke or say something amusing. The other person laughs and then feels embarrassed for laughing at something that they decide now was quite weak so they groan. But they shouldn't really groan if they laughed first.