Find that word
The OneLook Reverse Dictionary is ingenious, entertaining and might even be useful.
You know there's a word for something, but you can't remember it. Type your definition into the box, and the dictionary comes up with the word. For instance, I tried "phobia about the number 13" and it up it came: triskaidekaphobia.
If you don't have an exact definition leading to a single word, however, and you are using it as a general thesaurus, expect some odd results. "Wild euphoria" brought me elation, which is good, but also, lower down the list, fury, orgy, goose plum and lemon mint. Still, good fun.
When a pound was worth something
If you ever find yourself writing one of those phrases that goes 'which was worth £800 in 1860', you might want to take a look at this paper from the House of Commons Library.
Inflation: the value of the pound 1750-2002 gives you the chance to make a precise statement about what a given sum of money would buy at any date between those years.
I also explains the logic behind its calculations. You will see that 1p in 1750 would have bought as much as £1.36 last year. Prices have risen every year since 1945, although that is not inevitable: they dropped between 1919 and 1939.
Classic books
One of the best things about the Internet is the availability of the full texts of out-of-copyright books. Often, though, you have to download them as text on to your computer. (Try Project Gutenberg to see the riches available through that route.)
But here's a new site that has taken a handful of PG's books and turned them into elegant web pages, complete with illustrations and a useful search mechanism. It's called Authorama - Public Domain Books. Lovers of Diary of a Nobody will be pleased to find it there, and there's a particular pleasure in being able to find every reference to the 'scraper' that causes Mr Pooter such trouble. Request: can we have Three Men In a Boat next, please?