Are you a 22 or 24 carat kind of Guy or Gal. or person or...

[James32]

4 minutes ago, rElks said:

English is Hard

We'll begin with a box, and the plural is boxes,

But the plural of ox becomes oxen, not oxes.

One fowl is a goose, but two are called geese,

Yet the plural of moose should never be meese.

You may find a lone mouse or a nest full of mice,

Yet the plural of house is houses, not hice.

 

If the Plural of man is always called men,

Why shouldn't the plural of pan be called pen?

If I speak of my foot and show you my feet, 

And I give you a boot, would a pair be called beet?

If one is a tooth and a whole set are teeth,

Why shouldn't the plural of booth be called beeth?

 

Then on may be that, and three would be those,

Yet hat in the plural would never be hose,

and the plural of cat is cats, not cose.

We speak of a brother and also a brethren,

But though we ay mother, we never say methren.

 

Author Unknown

Then the masculine pronouns are he, his and him,

But the plural is not the, this or thim!

What an entrance lol, welcome to the forum. 

 

[LawrenceChard]

11 minutes ago, rElks said:

English is Hard

We'll begin with a box, and the plural is boxes,

But the plural of ox becomes oxen, not oxes.

One fowl is a goose, but two are called geese,

Yet the plural of moose should never be meese.

You may find a lone mouse or a nest full of mice,

Yet the plural of house is houses, not hice.

 

If the Plural of man is always called men,

Why shouldn't the plural of pan be called pen?

If I speak of my foot and show you my feet, 

And I give you a boot, would a pair be called beet?

If one is a tooth and a whole set are teeth,

Why shouldn't the plural of booth be called beeth?

 

Then on may be that, and three would be those,

Yet hat in the plural would never be hose,

and the plural of cat is cats, not cose.

We speak of a brother and also a brethren,

But though we ay mother, we never say methren.

 

Author Unknown

Then the masculine pronouns are he, his and him,

But the plural is not the, this or thim!

The boss at our local zoo realised we did not have a mongoose.

He asked his secretary to ask a supplier for a pair of them.

She wrote "Can you please supply us with two mongeese?"

Realising that didn't sound right, she "corrected" it to mongi.

Then she tried mongooses. The boss didn't like that.

After some thought and discussion, they decided to write "Please send us a mongoose"

P.S. Please send us another one.

😎

[Stuntman]

What is sauce for the mongoose should be sauce for the mongander 😉

[SovereignBishop]

On 16/02/2022 at 22:00, CANV said:

I always preferred the Brits.  but after picking up a few Sovs and a Krug im starting to appreciate the more robust Bullion coinage 

Love a sovereign. They and half sovs are all I own.

[SidS]

I love the anecdote about double fisting, certainly Not what sprang into my mind I can tell you.

To be fair a lot of the Americanisms I often use myself, 'coffee to go' for example.

There's only one thing Americans say which drives me up the wall and that's...

"I'll write you later."

Instead of the British version "I'll write to you later."

I guess on reflection it's only like saying "I'll phone you", but still.

I can deal everything else, even with 'rout' and 'booey' for 'route' and 'buoy'.

As for US spelling, a lot of that came from traditional British spelling so it doesn't bother me.

Samuel Johnson who wrote the British version of the dictionary decided English didn't look refined enough and decided to make it look more like French or Latin. Hence the old spelling of 'dette' became 'debt' as in Latin 'debitum'. Amusingly 'color' was altered to 'colour', same with 'favor' changing to 'favour'.

So the Yanks are doing it the original way, same with US customary units of measure which were based on old English measures, it was the UK which changed the measurement system to 'imperial' in the 1820s.

[rElks]

16 hours ago, James32 said:

What an entrance lol, welcome to the forum. 

 

Thanks James32

[MetalMandible]

For silver, .925 makes sense when its for something that will be actually handled on a regular basis...  But for gold, that is only to be stashed away and kept safe in capsules/tubes/ etc 24 carat clearly makes the most sense.

[LawrenceChard]

7 hours ago, SidS said:

There's only one thing Americans say which drives me up the wall and that's...

"I'll write you later."

Instead of the British version "I'll write to you later."

I guess on reflection it's only like saying "I'll phone you", but still.

I can deal everything else, even with 'rout' and 'booey' for 'route' and 'buoy'.

 

I disagree about "I guess on reflection it's only like saying "I'll phone you", 

Here "you" are the object of the verb "phone", "I'll phone to you" would make no sense.

In "I'll write you later.", "you" is not the object of the verb "write", but is what would be the dative in Latin, or an indirect object "to you". The direct object, which has been omitted, would be "a letter / postcard / e-mail, etc", as in "I'll write a letter to you later."

"I'll write You later." could be correct if said by Caroline Kepnes.

It would be correct to say "I'll draw / paint / shoot you", as in all these cases, "you" is the direct object of the verb.

Rout also annoys / amuses me. I feel sure the English word "route" is from French, as in en route.

I heard booey (for buoy) on a YouTube video recently, and could hardly believe it. A newly arrive Martian could be excused for saying boo-oy, which would be far more locial and sensible than "booey", effectively pronouncing "o" as "e", or "oy" as "ey".

😎

 

 

[LawrenceChard]

1 hour ago, MetalMandible said:

For silver, .925 makes sense when its for something that will be actually handled on a regular basis...  But for gold, that is only to be stashed away and kept safe in capsules/tubes/ etc 24 carat clearly makes the most sense.

Sure .925 silver makes sense if it is for circulation, or to be handled for some other reason, but otherwise yu might as well have .999 silver for stacking and investing.

It is an exact parallel with gold, where .916 or .900 is good for circulation, but 999 is good for stacking and investing.

Apart from local import duties which might give preferential treatment to 999 gold, there is no compelling reason to prefer .999 over .925; with the possible exception being if any mint were dumb enough to make it look like copper by excluding any silver from the alloy, but hey, who would be that stupid?

😎

[SidS]

16 minutes ago, LawrenceChard said:

I disagree about "I guess on reflection it's only like saying "I'll phone you", 

Here "you" are the object of the verb "phone", "I'll phone to you" would make no sense.

In "I'll write you later.", "you" is not the object of the verb "write", but is what would be the dative in Latin, or an indirect object "to you". The direct object, which has been omitted, would be "a letter / postcard / e-mail, etc", as in "I'll write a letter to you later."

"I'll write You later." could be correct if said by Caroline Kepnes.

It would be correct to say "I'll draw / paint / shoot you", as in all these cases, "you" is the direct object of the verb.

Rout also annoys / amuses me. I feel sure the English word "route" is from French, as in en route.

I heard booey (for buoy) on a YouTube video recently, and could hardly believe it. A newly arrive Martian could be excused for saying boo-oy, which would be far more locial and sensible than "booey", effectively pronouncing "o" as "e", or "oy" as "ey".

😎

 

 

See intuitively my brain knew all that and knew why "I'll write you" didn't make sense but I couldn't have put it as succinctly as you have.

[dicker]

1 hour ago, LawrenceChard said:

Sure .925 silver makes sense if it is for circulation, or to be handled for some other reason, but otherwise yu might as well have .999 silver for stacking and investing.

It is an exact parallel with gold, where .916 or .900 is good for circulation, but 999 is good for stacking and investing.

Apart from local import duties which might give preferential treatment to 999 gold, there is no compelling reason to prefer .999 over .925; with the possible exception being if any mint were dumb enough to make it look like copper by excluding any silver from the alloy, but hey, who would be that stupid?

😎

Quite.  

Should the RM have minted stick to the Gold rather than the horrible copper colour, I would have bought them all including all proofs.  

I derive far more pleasure from collecting Victoria Sovs and there is no Queue system!

[dicker]

1 hour ago, LawrenceChard said:

I disagree about "I guess on reflection it's only like saying "I'll phone you", 

Here "you" are the object of the verb "phone", "I'll phone to you" would make no sense.

In "I'll write you later.", "you" is not the object of the verb "write", but is what would be the dative in Latin, or an indirect object "to you". The direct object, which has been omitted, would be "a letter / postcard / e-mail, etc", as in "I'll write a letter to you later."

"I'll write You later." could be correct if said by Caroline Kepnes.

It would be correct to say "I'll draw / paint / shoot you", as in all these cases, "you" is the direct object of the verb.

Rout also annoys / amuses me. I feel sure the English word "route" is from French, as in en route.

I heard booey (for buoy) on a YouTube video recently, and could hardly believe it. A newly arrive Martian could be excused for saying boo-oy, which would be far more locial and sensible than "booey", effectively pronouncing "o" as "e", or "oy" as "ey".

😎

 

 

My wife is Australian and they pronounce Buoy and Router incorrectly.

 

[CANV]

Listening to an American say herb is borderline painful 

[LawrenceChard]

12 minutes ago, dicker said:

My wife is Australian and they pronounce Buoy and Router incorrectly.

 

How does she pronounce them?

...and how does she pronounce transportation?

[SidS]

14 minutes ago, CANV said:

Listening to an American say herb is borderline painful 

Eww 'orreganno' instead of oregano, that does hurt.

I've even heard 'baysil' instead of 'basil'.

[dikefalos]

On 17/02/2022 at 11:05, HerefordBullyun said:

why all your toilet handles and sink taps are made of 24k gold like Saddam in Basra palace, King james the 23rd. With your gold leaf toilet paper and i know you sometime have to resort to your £50 notes  

🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

 

I swear to god, if we would have been class mates in high school, i would have come to school at least once a week. 

Edited February 22, 2022 by dikefalos

[dicker]

15 minutes ago, LawrenceChard said:

How does she pronounce them?

...and how does she pronounce transportation?

Rowter 

Booooey

Like all Australians she denies the convict history.  

[kimchi]

I'm a bit confused by some of these! The expression 'it's not rocket science' has been in common use here since I were a lad (and I'm no spring chicken!) @dicker. Maybe we had some particularly 'linguistically-forceful' Americans stationed in Kent during the war or something?!! 🤣 Oddly enough, some Americanisms seem to have got here via Australia! My sister for some reason was particularly influenced by Neighbours and Home and Away (the early years) and she's said 'can I get..?' and other things (the one I do notice as grating every time is 'arvo') for almost 40 years! It seems normal to me, and I was surprised to see that one pointed out (though since you did I couldn't agree more!). It's amazing what one filters out at times - in the case of 'can I get' for most of my life it transpires!

On 21/02/2022 at 19:42, LawrenceChard said:

One common Americanism is verbing nouns.

Another, even worse is verbing adjectives, for example "a colorized coin", instead of "a coloured coin".

 

Yank: "I have just gotten my degree in English"

'Colorize' is in the Oxford dictionary. It'd be interesting to see when it appeared, it may very well be since the advent of common digital technology. There's a chance it could go back much further though considering the early colorized films. I don't think Joseph and the Extremely Colourful Dreamcoat has quite the same ring to it but that may be me This is a useful one imo as it's distinct from 'coloured'. It usually means to colour (or to have be in colour) something that wasn't originally designed or intended to be, whereas e.g. both monochrome and coloured sketches by Monet exist.

'Gotten' is a fascinating one as it comes from where English changed here, but remained the same as at the time of the settlers in America. There are quite a few others, but I've forgotten them It's been almost two decades since I had a linguist colleague in America, fascinating chap. For example, there's an extremely remote settlement in Peru iirc (it may be Chile or Bolivia) in the Andes where they speak the purest version of some form of 'Welsh' from four hundred odd years ago that exists.

It's a funny old world!

[kimchi]

2 hours ago, LawrenceChard said:

Here "you" are the object of the verb "phone", "I'll phone to you" would make no sense.

In "I'll write you later.", "you" is not the object of the verb "write", but is what would be the dative in Latin, or an indirect object "to you". The direct object, which has been omitted, would be "a letter / postcard / e-mail, etc", as in "I'll write a letter to you later."

 

[Minimalist]

1 hour ago, CANV said:

Listening to an American say herb is borderline painful 

When they describe the UK as "England" or *deep breaths*…… "isnt Scotland part of England".

😡🤬

[dicker]

@kimchi, I am far from infallible, In my world “rocket science” is an American term, and rarely used by Brits. Perhaps a regional and Industry thing?

With regard to the Welsh speakers in Argentina, I went to a lecture a long time ago when a Welsh soldier recounted talking to a mortally injured Argentinian in Welsh. A long way from both of their homes.

Best

Dicker

 

[LawrenceChard]

1 hour ago, dicker said:

Rowter 

Booooey

Like all Australians she denies the convict history.  

Maybe she learnt English from an American.

Re convicts: she is supposed to answer "you mean all those people from Britain?"

😎

[LawrenceChard]

39 minutes ago, kimchi said:

I'm a bit confused by some of these! The expression 'it's not rocket science' has been in common use here since I were a lad (and I'm no spring chicken!) @dicker. Maybe we had some particularly 'linguistically-forceful' Americans stationed in Kent during the war or something?!! 🤣 Oddly enough, some Americanisms seem to have got here via Australia! My sister for some reason was particularly influenced by Neighbours and Home and Away (the early years) and she's said 'can I get..?' and other things (the one I do notice as grating every time is 'arvo') for almost 40 years! It seems normal to me, and I was surprised to see that one pointed out (though since you did I couldn't agree more!). It's amazing what one filters out at times - in the case of 'can I get' for most of my life it transpires!

'Colorize' is in the Oxford dictionary. It'd be interesting to see when it appeared, it may very well be since the advent of common digital technology. There's a chance it could go back much further though considering the early colorized films. I don't think Joseph and the Extremely Colourful Dreamcoat has quite the same ring to it but that may be me This is a useful one imo as it's distinct from 'coloured'. It usually means to colour (or to have be in colour) something that wasn't originally designed or intended to be, whereas e.g. both monochrome and coloured sketches by Monet exist.

'Gotten' is a fascinating one as it comes from where English changed here, but remained the same as at the time of the settlers in America. There are quite a few others, but I've forgotten them It's been almost two decades since I had a linguist colleague in America, fascinating chap. For example, there's an extremely remote settlement in Peru iirc (it may be Chile or Bolivia) in the Andes where they speak the purest version of some form of 'Welsh' from four hundred odd years ago that exists.

It's a funny old world!

What is "television" in Tierra del Fuegoan Welsh?

[CANV]

I’ll think they call it Scotlandland.    Or sometimes Scotchland.    Some of the English counties get a similar battering as well 

[kimchi]

13 minutes ago, dicker said:

@kimchi, I am far from infallible, In my world “rocket science” is an American term, and rarely used by Brits. Perhaps a regional and Industry thing?

With regard to the Welsh speakers in Argentina, I went to a lecture a long time ago when a Welsh soldier recounted talking to a mortally injured Argentinian in Welsh. A long way from both of their homes.

Best

Dicker

Yes, very interesting! 'Rocket science' has always been the standard phrase here (with 'brain surgery' a distant second) and I can't imagine things being so very different between Kent and Cambridgeshire (and I partly grew up in Herts and still spend a lot of time there). 'Rocket' is from European languages but I would guess it's a safe bet that modern usage came from the American space program.

It wasn't Argentina - my friend was talking about a very specific Welsh dialect spoken by a mountain people (I'm pretty sure it was Peru) that haven't left the area for hundreds of years - just a village of them. I wish I recalled the full story, it was quite something. Iirc the dialect is not one that many people in Wales now would be able to fully understand.

One interesting thing about moving to Asia for a number of years was how new phrases took hold in the UK when I came back for holidays, often in a relatively short space of time. 'No brainer' was one that puzzled me greatly at first. It was also the rise of the (commonplace) internet and mobile phone so us expats (of various nationalities) had our own self-developed terms for things like sending text messages. 'Text' as a verb was completely new to me when I returned, and felt very strange.

One I can't stand (and I don't know why) is 'reaching out' in the media e.g. 'we've reached out to Sony for comment'.