Idiom of the week: A bookworm

Are you a bookworm? It may sound nasty, but if you enjoy reading, then yes -you're definitely a bookworm! 

We call someone a bookworm when they spend hours devouring books, probably as a reference to real bookworms (=insects), which delight in eating and settling in books. It's not like that happens very often nowadays thanks to the new materials books are made of, but insects, humidity, rodents or extreme temperatures used to be a dramatic threat in libraries not so long ago. In fact, the equivalent idiom in Spanish for "bookworm" is "ratón / rata de biblioteca" for the very same reason.

Being called a bookworm (or a mouse / rat) doesn't probably sound like the nicest compliment on Earth, but in these crazy days of computers, tablets, iPhones and other hi-tech stuff, I do feel a twinge of fondness whenever I see someone holding an old, good book in the train or by the seaside.

"You're the same today as you'll be in five years, 

except for the people you meet and the books you read."

(Charlie "Tremendous" Jones)