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It’s a great reminder of how messily human the stories behind even our sleekest creations are – not to mention delightful curiosities in their own right.

1. Avatar
This word for our digital incarnations has a mysterious origin to it, beginning with the Sanskrit term avatara, that is often used to describe the descent of a god from the heavens into an earthly form. Arriving in the English dictionary sometime in late 18th century, via Hindi, the term largely preserved its mystical meaning until Neal Stephenson’s 1992 novel Snow Crash popularized it in a technological sense.

Fusing notions of virtual world-building and incarnation, it’s the perfect emblem of computers as a portal to a new species of experience.

There are so many online avatar/character to pick from, it’s hard to keep track of them all. Indeed, it’s also hard to even find them.

As a writer, I like to picture my characters on paper, and since I can’t draw anything, I turn to these nifty tools to make my characters literally come to life.

2. Hashtags
In 1920s America, the # sign was used as a shorthand for weight in pounds (and they still call it the pound sign). It was first brought to pubic usage thanks to its adoption by telephone engineers at Bell Labs in the 1960s – and if you’re looking to sound clever, you could call it an “octothorpe”, the  term coined at Bell to describe it. It’s on Twitter, though, that hashtags have really come into their own, serving as a kind of function code for social interaction #Top10List.

3. Scunthorpe problems
Computing can be as much combat as collaboration between people and machines, and the Scunthorpe problem is a perfect example. The Scunthorpe Problem arise when search engines create a filter to exclude the use of some words and because the word Scunthorpe contains a very certain word, this prevents residents of Scunthorpe from opening accounts and from people who were searching for businesses in Scunthorpe from finding them. Similar issues were found in Penistone in Yorkshire, Lightwater in Surrey and Clitheroe in Lancashire.

4. Trolling

Interrnet trolling can be defined as the anti-social act of causing of interpersonal conflict and shock-value controversy online.

As you’ve probably already know, there are people lurking all over the web who find pure joy in humiliating and attacking others. Tapping the expertise of psychologists and experts, it offers solid reasons why this scourge of the Internet continues.

We all like to think that most people mean well, and are inherently good. Even if that’s true, studies show us instances where even some good people can quickly turn bad, all because of a variety of situations related to mob behavior.

When people think they can stay anonymous, they do things they otherwise would not do.  When conversations are not taking place in real time, some people feel like they can quickly dash off a negative comment and then immediately escape altogether. And when people get all wrapped up in their narcissism and rebelliousness, they might be more likely to pick on others they don’t even know.

5. Memes
Richard Dawkins coined the term “meme” in his 1976 book The Selfish Gene as a shortening of the Ancient Greek term mimeme (“an imitated thing”). He designed his new word to sound like “gene”, signifying a unit of cultural transmission. Little did he know that his term would become one of the most iconic of online phenomena, embodying the capacity of the internet to itself act as a kind of gene-pool for thoughts and beliefs – and for infectious, endlessly ingenious slices of time-wasting.

No one is really sure about what happens to you upon death. One thing for sure is that the last moments in life are filled with honesty, unless you are one of the egoistic, sadistic individuals who only care about themselves.

I believe that the final word a person speaks are quite revealing and speaks volumes about a person’s character. They show the rest of us what exactly they are feeling, thinking and seeing.

This article examines 10 uncanny last words from people we may or may not remember for good or bad reasons. Let’s see if you agree. Be sure to comment about your likes and dislikes.

1. Humphrey Bogart:

Quote: “I Should Never Have Switched From Scotch to Martini”

Description: An American actor, he was widely regarded as a cultural icon. He died at 57, weighing only 80 lbs. when he died, after falling into a coma. America lost one of the greatest stars in the history of American Cinema; that is according to American Film Institute.

2. Carl Panzram

Quote: “Hurry up, you Hoosier bastard, I could kill ten men while you’re fooling around.”

Description: Carl Panzram was an American serial killer, rapist, arsonist and burglar. He was executed on September 30, 1930. In his last words, the word “Hoosier” was used. It referred to people from Indiana. It came from the Gene Hackman movie about the basketball team.

3. James French:

Quote: “Hey Fellas! How about this for a headline for tomorrow’s paper? ‘French Fries.’”

Description: French was serving a life sentence when he realized that a life sentence is a long time. Unwilling to complete it, he killed his cell mate in an effort to have himself executed. He was afraid of suicide and was not willing to go through with it.

4. Jack Daniel:

Quote: “One last drink please.”

Description: Daniel was an American distiller and founder of the Tennessee whiskey of the same name. He died of blood poisoning on October 10, 1911, which started in his big toe, which he injured kicking a safe. Even.

5. George Harrison:

Quote: “Love one another.”

Description: What a sweet man. This world did not just lose a Beatle, it lost a young legend with much potential ahead of him.

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Charades is a game fun to play, especially during house parties, family and friend gathering and school outings. They bring events into liveliness, especially when thought out carefully. Here are 10 words and phrases one should consider when playing.

1. Sexy:

I got to admit that this was the hardest word to enact. My friend did a good sexy pose, but many felt he was doing a “striptease” more than the sexy. It was way too confusing, but fun to watch. I know the whole party was laughing from this one.

2. ‘Self-Please’:

This is one of the vague phrases one can add to a game of charades. One friend decided to enact a scene which told her viewers she was engaging in naughty activities. Then she proceeded to beg as if she was playing mercy. Interestingly enough, viewers got the picture.

3. A unique person’s name:

I always put the name of someone who has a very unique attitude towards life. This one person never gets the picture that what he does is bothersome. When we enacted his behaviour to show our disgust, he finally understood what we meant. Taking uncomfortable pictures and staying at someone’s house till 4am is not nice.

4. Please:

This is always a good pun to use. You get really mixed results in the game of charades. You would have those who are begging and you would have those who are polite. One thing is clear: this word produces massive results from both ends of the spectrum.

5. Charlie Sheen:

He is a funny character to enact. Players can really be creative with this one. The thing is surely entertaining but sad at the same time.

I examined Oxford English Dictionary’s list of top 30 words commonly used in the English language. I then put their statistics and findings to the test. I randomly chose 2 monologues and 2 newspaper articles with excerpts of 100 words each. I looked at how frequently each article used the top 30 words identified by Oxford English Dictionary. Here is my list of Top 10 Commonly Used English Words.

1. And:

Almost all sentences have ‘and’. Sometimes the word is overused, making sentences large and run-on. If you want to combine two or more nouns, ‘and’ is the word to used. If you would like to add two or more interrelated ideas, you need to use this word as well. It sometimes is silenced with a comma and semi-colon, but still is essential in the sentence.

2. The:

You need this preposition in just about every sentence. You cannot use the word ‘the’ without a noun. ‘The’ is also used and replaced with this, these, that and those to stipulate a reflection. It is thus not surprising that it is one of the most commonly used word

3. Of:

This very commonly used word as well. It is commonly used to express emotion and sometimes possessions. For example: I would like to have a piece of the piece.

4. It:

This is quite commonly used word as well to describe a thing or an object. Many sentences in the monologue used the word subsequently after mentioning the object once.

5. To:

Anytime you would like to do something or say something in future and conditional tenses, you need this word. All verbs that are used in these tenses will have to in the front. For example, I would like to go to the movies. How many of us have used the root of this sentence before? Just about everybody.

So many people have said some very memorable things, and this list does not contain those; instead it is a top ten list of quotes that really should be more famous. Sir Winston Churchill made many pithy statements but the ones included here are those that are pertinent to today rather than only to the war years. In fact that is the criteria this list is based on; quotes that are as applicable today as when they were first uttered. The list does not include ancient quotes from Socrates or Plato although perhaps it should, however these can be included in another top10 list of quotes.

It was difficult to rate these quotes as they are all worthy of being number one, but here goes.

1. “Let’s be realistic! Demand the impossible.”

Think about this one; it actually makes a lot of sense in a negotiating situation. And it was said by Che Guevara who has to be one of the iconic figures of the 20th century, whatever your politics.

2. “Live as if you were to die tomorrow, learn as if you were to live forever.”

Mahatma Gandhi spoke these words and they reflect his philosophy. He, like Che was a revolutionary, although the road he took to achieve his ends was very different in the end to that of Che.

3. “Imagination is more important than knowledge.”

This was said by the great Albert Einstein who was a genius, but whose imaginative leap gave us the theory of relativity which has been more or less proved now. Imagination is extremely important as without it we would have no art, music of fiction.

4. “History is a relentless master. It has no present, only the past rushing into the future. To try to hold fast is to be swept aside.”

President John F. Kennedy. He demonstrated a good grasp of history which subsequent US Presidents (with the exception of Bill Clinton)did not seem to have. We certainly have to move with the times and look to the future and try to remedy mistakes of the past, not repeat them.

5. “I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character. I have a dream.” – (1963) Dr Martin Luther King Jr.

Dr King would no doubt be happy that at last a Black American is President if the united States, and while his dream has not totally come to fruition America has made great strides forward in the field of race relations since this speech was delivered in 1963.