I have been watching the news about the USA midterm elections with fascination. We have supposedly fixed term elections of five years for the Government, by elections where we choose councillors every four years but they don’t always coincide, and a few mayoral elections that are only for a few cities that have chosen to have them, like London, Birmingham, Manchester and Liverpool.

But this strange word keeps appearing in the US election ‘Goubernatorial’? Is that the spelling? It’s how it sounds. I would say Governatorial, as it is about the election of State Govenors. It is a real mouthful. Is it meant to be confusing, to sound clever, is it Latin? Or Greek? Who knows.

I think there’s a saying, something like: the United Kingdom and the United States of America are two nations seperated by a common language. Spellings of Sulphur (UK) and Sulfur (US), someone told me the Americans came up with simpler spellings. Also Neighbour (UK) and Neighbor (US)… Why not Neybor if you really want to simplify. And the pronunciation of Aluminium as Aloominum? Why? Many questions!