OT The queens Engilsh vs American OT

[greg g]

Well maye not the queen. We go to a trivia contest on Monday evenings, it consists of 5 rounds of questions, with the final round usually being matching or fill in the blanks.

Tonight we were given a list of supposidly common British terms for items, and their American equivelents, and told to match them up. We scored 6

Brit American

[*]1.Biro a. Astonish

[*]2.Bog roll b. Mailbox

[*]3.Courgette c.Toilet tissue

[*]4.Drawing Pin d.Thumbtack

[*]5.Engaged tone e.Drastically wrong

[*]6.Gobsmaked f.Ballpoint pen

[*]7.Mince g.ground beef

[*]8.Pillar h.Complain

[*]9.pear shaped i.Zuchinni

[*]10.Whinge j.Busy signal

Wonder how Robin will do????

[Don Coatney]

Why is it that a mince meat pie sounds better than a ground beef pie?

[RobertKB]

Biro - ballpoint pen

Bog roll - toilet paper

Courgette - drastically wrong

Drawing ping - thumbtack

Engaged tone - busy signal

Gobsmacked - Astonish

Mince - ground beef

Pillar - mailbox

pear shaped - zuchinni

Whinge - complain

I think that is right. I lived in London (great city) for three years and am familiar with a lot of the slang.

[greg g]

8 of 10 Robert.

[Robin (UK)]

8 of 10 Robert.

Yep. 8 out of 10.

A courgette is zucchini and 'going pear-shaped' is a colloquial phrase for something going wrong.

[Joe Flanagan]

I recently heard an Irish guy describing how an air conditioning mechanic messed up the ductwork in his house. He said that the guy "made the donkey's bollocks out of it." I still laugh every time I think of that expression.

[RobertKB]

Yep. 8 out of 10.

A courgette is zucchini and 'going pear-shaped' is a colloquial phrase for something going wrong.

Thanks for the correction. Those were the two I was not 100% sure of. Makes sense now that I think about it. Nouns and verbs, gotta love 'em.

[Don Coatney]

Nouns and verbs, gotta love 'em.

Geez, I did not know they used nouns and verbs in England and in Canada:D

[Plymouthy Adams]

Nouns and Verbs..what conference do they play in? laugh, but this is about the way of today's education..schools push sports more than acedemics..only real use I see for a high school coach is to patrol the bathrooms for smokers...next weel I will tell you what I really think...lol

[RobertKB]

Nouns and Verbs..what conference do they play in? laugh,

They play in the "Parts of Speech" conference which has six other teams: pronouns, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions, interjections. I was a coach in that conference for 31 years. I occasionally did patrol the washrooms for smokers, more commonly known as lunch hour supervision.

The other conference in that league is the "Figures of Speech".

Edited April 12, 2011 by RobertKB

[Plymouthy Adams]

well..I'll give you that but look around..they sure don't seem to be winning much lately...!

[55 Fargo]

Only term I have seen used in my Canada, and in my time here is Minced Beef, but not very often.

Our English and terminology is much cloned to American English...

[T120]

This thread brought to mind a humorous quote by John Cleese (for Monty Python fans)

"The three differences between American and British people:

- We speak English and you don't.

- When we hold a World Championship for a particular sport, we invite teams from other countries to play, as well.

- When you meet the head of state in Great Britain, you only have to go down on one knee."

[greg g]

I figued out that pear shaped was something that was wro, but my team mates didn't want to accpt my reasoning that it wasn't round. it wasn't square there it didn't fit either hole and therefor was wrong. Finally they relented and we scored that on.

They were positive that drawig pins were the ballpoints. I told them that thrumtacks were for securig drafting paper to the drawing board but to no avail. We miked up pillar and crochette.

[Joe Flanagan]

Minced beef sounds like something that is not really sure it wants to be beef or not. Like maybe it thinks it would rather be something else.

[hkestes41]

Back during the Clinton / Lewinski fiasco I saw a British comic on TV discussing with the host of the show the 3 main differences in the US and England. This is what he had to say;

In the UK we speak English - you don't.

In the UK when we have a sporting competition and name a world champion we actually invite teams from other countries - you don't

In the UK when we meet the head of state we only get down on one knee.

[Plymouthy Adams]

now where I have I seen that before???

[Flatie46]

I work for a British owned company, some that I work with have very thick accents. I tell ya, when they get excited or mad I have a hard time understanding those guys. I would have never thought English over there and here would be so different. They're a jolly bunch of blokes ater a pint or two though!

[Joe Flanagan]

I have some English friends who are Jordies (sp?). Have you ever heard them, Robin?

[RobertKB]

My dad, now 91, told me this story recently. He was born and raised a Londoner and before WWII he was riding on a tram and had to literally translate between a Cockney (East End Londoner) and Glaswegian (from Glasgow). Everyone was speaking English, after a fashion, but two of the three could not understand each other. I guess that makes my dad trilingual. He spent four years in the British army during the war and said there are even stranger accents around than those two.

Edited April 13, 2011 by RobertKB

[Robin (UK)]

I have some English friends who are Jordies (sp?). Have you ever heard them, Robin?

A strong Geordie accent can be very hard to understand, especially as there'll be lots of colloquial phrases included.

See if you can make any sense of this...

[Joe Flanagan]

To say the least. They put on a display for us, just talking as they would normally to one another. It was incredible.

[hkestes41]

I have made several trips to Livinsgston Scotland to work with Jabil (a large contract mfg.). On one trip I took our distribution sales manager with me and as one of the engineers is giving us a tour Karen kept asking me "what did he say" or "I can't uderstand 90% of what he says". My response was just wait until we go to dinner tonight and he has a couple of pints.

You give them a couple of beers and a sentence becomes one long word. I have to be looking directly at them so that I can partially read their lips to keep up with the conversation.