Etymophilia

The English language is a love of mine. Culture is shaped and defined by its language. And English is a fascinating amalgam of other languages and cultures. It's also always changing. We don't have a "Belles Lettres" to maintain standard usage, which has its benefits and drawbacks.

I especially love archaic English. The more arcane, the more delightful. I can thank my HS English teachers for that, who made us read Chaucer and Shakespeare with an OED and figure it out. Maths bored me; what's the point to solving equations with dead intractable formulas? It's all too simple. No, give me the ever-evolving, multi-influenced "problems" of language.  

If words fascinate you too, here are some bits of fun for a cold winter day...

common Tolkein terms:
http://www.glyphweb.com/arda/words.html

general etymology:
http://www.etymonline.com/

the Wiktionary:
http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Wiktionary:Main_Page

and here's some phrase origins, for contextual history:
http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/36400.html