gallimaufry

On the fifth day, a druid and a cobbler (who were "just friends") fell in with the ragged band of survivors. So did a mahout with a haunted look and a nervous elephant. The day after, they found a baby by the remains of an abandoned camp site, alive, and guarded by a dog. Nobody had the heart to leave them behind. Three travelling minstrels asked to join them for protection at the last carrefour before the Old Wood. The party spend the night there and, after breaking camp at dawn, the whole gallimaufry plunged into the forest. A few hundred paces into the cool gloom, the jester, who was leading the way, stopped short at the sight of a little girl sitting at the base of the Big Tree. She had an unusual smile.

gallimaufry

Her desk was piled with a gallimaufry of papers and notes and instructions and deadlines, and she didn't know where to start. So she carried on playing Solitaire, because that was easier than making decisions about work.

gallimaufry

gal·li·mau·fry

a hodgepodge; jumble; confused medley.

She plodded through the gallimaufry of data, hoping to find something significant to report to her funders.

Oi!

Am I playing by myself here?

vexillology

First contact was a remarkably smooth affair, perhaps because the Intergalactic Federation representatives have been through the process many, many times before and the Federation has been studying Earth for more than fifty years. As it were, the first casualty that could even be remotely associated with alien contact was 76 year-old scholar Søren Andersen, generally considered the finest student of vexillology the planet has ever produced. The distinction earned him a spot in one of the early cultural contingents that were granted access to the Federation archives. Colleagues later remarked that he appeared entirely unfazed by, even oblivious to, the rather bizarre and varied physical presence of alien representatives, and alien technology made travelling no more taxing than a ride in an elevator. By all accounts he appeared perfectly fine until, finally, he was admitted to the Flag Hall, sporting nothing but the flags, in the broadest sense of the word, of just under 740,000 Federation members. There, his heart managed to handle the strain of undiluted rapture for eight of the finest minutes a human being can be granted.

vexillology

study of flags

The World Cup was the perfect stage for aspiring students of vexillology, as they tried to remember which way up the South Korean yin-yang was supposed to go, and which South American country had which version of the sun. Vexillologists rolled their eyes in horror at all the upside-down flags, flags being dragged along the ground, flags being draped over revellers' backs.