I was at a meeting recently. The usual business of N people seeking to sit in N-1 chairs. Then M. Ermerod mispronounced the word 'gratuitous'. He said it as if it were 'grat-wheatus'. Now, I have nothing against a man who mangles his speech in this homey, easygoing way, why, many a political candidate has sewn up a diffident rural vote by means of this show of disarming simplicity, but M. Ermerod is nothing if not cautious about his linguistic competence. Even to imply that he had misused a word—let alone mispronounced it entirely—would be objectively to support Saddam Hussein. So no-one wanted to say anything, in fact we were all busy scribbling down the important fact: from now on, the word gratuitous' is to be pronounced 'grat-wheatus'. We add it to our lexicon of boss-speak.