Conference thebay::joyoflex

    Are those who walk down British streets wearing American-made casual
    gear labeled
    
                               "B.U.M. Equipment"
    
    summarily arrested?
    

re <<< Note 1085.1 

Wasn't a "bum" a debt collector in the '20s? 

I _still_ want to know about mom/mum!


Chele

.0>  Why is it that U.S. mothers are "mom" and U.K. & OZ mothers are "mum"?

My wife, who is English, is physically incapable of pronouncing the word "mom".
So, to answer your question, ...

1)  Brits say "mum" because they are unable to pronounce the word correctly.
    They spell it "mum" to cover up this failing.

2)  The Australian use of "mum", like most of their exotic style of speaking,
    is English in origin.

    See also topic 31.

Nope ... it is all a matter of heritage ...

In the UK, formal address was mother (pronounced like muther), and hence
mummy, and mum are normal dimimutives.

In other languages the diminutive is mama which is closer to the 'o'
sound associated with mom.

That said, I have heard English people use mom and N. Americans use mum.

Stuart

>In other languages the diminutive is mama which is closer to the 'o'
>sound associated with mom.

I'm not sure of your point, but
in my dictionary (Concise Oxford) the pronunciation of "mama"
with the first "a" as in "ago", which doesn't sound anywhere
near like the sound of the "o" in "mom".

>I'm not sure of your point, but
>in my dictionary (Concise Oxford) the pronunciation of "mama"
>with the first "a" as in "ago", which doesn't sound anywhere
>near like the sound of the "o" in "mom".
    
    (We'll ignore the fact that there's [at least] a verb missing... %^)
    
    In my neck of the woods (northern New Jersey), "mama" is pronounced
    MAH-mah -- the first "a" has the same sound as "balm" or "bomb" --
    "mom" is pronounced MAHm -- to me ears, it's the same vowel sound.
                                                         

    Re .2 and 
    
    >Wasn't a "bum" a debt collector in the '20s?
    
    Yes, sort of, but it was in the 1620s, not 1920s
    
    NSOED gives 10 meanings:
    
    Mid 14th C	n. buttocks
    Mid 16th C	n. worthless person
    Early 17th	n. in full - bum-bailiff, from the fact he approached from
    		   behind - a bailiff involved in arrests
    Mid 19th C	n. USA a loafer or tramp
    Late 19th 	n. USA vagrant
    Mid 14th C	v. hum loudly
    Late 16th 	v. long, yearn
    Late 16th 	v. strike, beat, thump
    Mid 19th C	v. USA wander aimlessly
    Mid 19th C	v. cadge or scrounge

re <<< Note 1085.8 by ATYISB::HILL "Don't worry, we have a cunning plan!" >>>

>    >Wasn't a "bum" a debt collector in the '20s?
    
>    Yes, sort of, but it was in the 1620s, not 1920s
    

I first saw the expression "bum-baileff" in a Ngaio Marsh novel, set in the 
1920s, so the milage may vary on the longevity of usage.

    	The Oxford dictionary gives "bum-bailiff" as "bailiff employed for
    making arrests". That would place it earlier than "bobbies" or
    "peelers", i.e., earlier than the 1820s. The concept is certainly
    medi�val since the term "bum-bailiff" is used consistently to translate
    the original "chiquanous" in my translation of Rabelais, but that
    proves nothing since it is a modern translation.

    In the USA, bum has another meaning: to "borrow,or avail onseself of"
    as in:
    
    "Can I bum a cigarette from you?"
    
    "Can I bum a ride to work?"

    In the UK we refer to that sort of borrowing or availing oneself as
    'cadge or scrounge'
    
    like what I put in the last line of .8
    
    ;-)

    I looked up "cadge" and yes, indeed, that's exactly the meaning I
    meant -- specifically, it defined it as "mooch."  Earlier, I had only
    looked up "scrounge" and its meaning leaned more toward "forage".
    
    Another meaning for "scrounge" was to "wheedle, at no cost." I like it.
    		
    	     				andrew

    Well, since someone else brought up the topic...
    
    I am an avid fan of Fawlty Towers, which probably explains a lot of
    things, but that's another subject.  At the beginning of each episode
    there is a long shot of the "Inn" with the "Fawlty Towers" sign in the
    foreground.  Somewhere after the first episode, where the sign is shown
    with a couple of letters askew, the sign begins to be "defaced" by
    persons unknown who re-arrange the letters is "Fawlty Towers" to form
    other, interesting words and phrases.
    
    Now, to my question.  In one of the episodes the re-arrangement takes
    the form: "Flowery Twats".  I'm surprised that this hasn't been
    censored in the US, where "twat" is an impolite term for female
    genitalia.  Does it have the same connotation in the UK?  If so, does
    the UK have a greater tolerance for this sort of thing appearing on the
    tube than the US?  Or, did the "Fawlty" crew manage to put one over on
    all of us?

    	I am probably dictionarily disadvantaged, but none of my
    English dictionaries have an entry between "twang" and "tweak". I have
    found it in an English-French dictionary with translations of "con" and
    "gonzesse". I think most English people would know the meaning.
    
    	The acceptability of various words varies a lot between cultures.
    There was a French government advertising campaign based on "la drogue
    c'est con" (you're a twat to do drugs).
    
    	Along the same lines, the VMS random password generator has a
    filter in it to try to ensure that it doesn't generate obscene words,
    and a group of us in Valbonne got together to submit a QAR that it was
    completely inadequate in Europe, and gave translations into the various
    European languages. When it came to translating "tits" into Swedish we
    drew a complete blank, (and left a blank in the table) and just added a
    footnote that in Sweden all forms of the female breast are acceptable.

>    	I am probably dictionarily disadvantaged, but none of my
>    English dictionaries have an entry between "twang" and "tweak". I have
  
Indeed you are disadvantged.  Even my office Concise Oxford (6th ed; 1976)
has 'twas, twat, and twayblade in that gap.

    	*sigh*... I don't have an office dictionary, and the last two
    dictionaries we bought for home use were French-Italian and
    French-Arabic. Maybe I need a business trip to an English speaking
    country.

    In England one wintry night out on icy roads, driving along behind what
    we would call a "sander" in the U.S., I was much amused by the sign
    affixed to the back of the truck which said, "Caution, gritting in
    progress" which, especially if said aloud ("gritting in pr*oa*gress" is
    how it would be pronounced) seems so out of character for the rough and
    tumble character  of the operation to an American speaker.
    In the U.S. the sign would have said either just "sanding" or "sanding
    underway". I further realized as I drove along that I was no doubt
    following not a sanding truck, but rather a gritting lorry.
    Bruce

Ahhh ...  but was this vehicle spreading sand or grit ????

Out here in CXO, the trucks actually grit, not sand ... The stuff they
spread is actually quite coarse ... and definitely too coarse to be
called sand.

Stuart

    I'm an American with a fondness for British literature.  I usually
    understand all the Britishisms, but here's one that I don't:
    
    In a novel, one character gave another "an old fashioned look" --
    indeed, "a look so old fashioned it might have belonged to an
    ammonite."  I've run into the "old fashioned look" in a couple of other
    places, all British.  The context was never enough to help me decipher
    the meaning.  Suspicious?  Prim?  Disapproving?  Sardonic?
    
    What does it mean?
    
    Earl Wajenberg

    ... if it might have belonged to an ammonite, it could be said to be a
    sort of "many-faceted" or even a "compound" sort of look...
    
    In later �ons, that sort of look came to be called "bug-eyed."
    
    As we say elsewhere, "Hope this helps.   :-) "
    

    If I gave you an old-fashioned look it would indicate that I considered
    you to be either lying or eccentric. The reference to ammonites is just
    poetic exaggeration.
    
    I believe the ammonites, while having an external shell, were actually
    more closely related to the octopuses and squids, which have excellent
    eyesight with a pair of eyes that are not multi-faceted.

    You may well be right, Brian...  I knew the ammonites were around the
    same time as the trilobites, which -- as I was intrigued to learn a few
    years back when I saw a closeup of a fossil -- looked like they had
    compound eyes.  However I just looked up ammonites in my encyclopedia &
    while there is no text around the picture, it looks like a snailish
    organism with a shell.  Guess you paid more attention in paleontology
    class... -- or were you just recalling your youth?  :-)
       

    ... When thou comest nigh over against the children of Ammon, distress
    them not, nor meddle with them: for I will not give thee of the land of
    Ammon any possession; because I have given it unto the children of Lot
    for a possession. (That also was accounted a land of giants; giants
    dwelt therein in old time; and the Ammonites call them Zamzummims ...
    
    	Deuteronomy 3:20, but I never knew them personally ;-)

    �Suspicious?  Prim?  Disapproving?  Sardonic?
    All those things, and the ones Dave (was it?) gave as well. The point
    about an old fashioned look is that is says more about the upbringing
    of the donor than of the recipient - so it usually maps very
    approximately to disapproving or disbelieving, but with the further
    connotations that:
    
    	o 	the looker is too well-bred to voice the dis-whatever
    		(because their governess had told them not to be impolite)
    	o	but the looker wants to make their dis-whatever absolutely 
    		clear. 
    
    Children don't have governesses now, and that's what makes the look old
    fashioned. (Of course, people who had an ordinary schooling are quite
    capable of giving an old fashioned look, but I think the origins of the
    phrase have something to do with education [in its broadest sense]).
    
    The reference to ammonites was just a play on the meaning of
    old-fashioned (in the novel, not in Deuteronomy).
    
    b

    Thanks, all.  Disapproving disbelief fits all the contexts
    ("contices"?) perfectly.  I am well-versed enough to paleontology to
    recognize the ammonite reference as a humorous exaggeration; I just
    thought I'd share it with you.
    
    Here's another question about British English.  What's a "git"? 
    Context makes it clear that it is an undesirable or contemptible person.
    I would guess it is related to "beget" and means someone who, roughly, 
    has no accomplishments to their credit beyond the minimal ones of getting 
    begotten and born.  Right?  Or might it be synonymous with "bastard"?
    
    Earl Wajenberg

    �I am well-versed enough to paleontology to
    �recognize the ammonite reference as a humorous exaggeration; I just
    �thought I'd share it with you.
     Yeah, I didn't want to teach my grandmother to suck eggs, but I
    detected (perhaps na�vely) a tendency for a rathole to get fixated
    on the `sight' thing, just because the expression was `an old fashioned
    look'. I don't think the novelist was being that precise.
    
    When I first met the word `git' I was told a git was a pregnant camel.
    I have no particular reason to believe this, and no need to delve
    deeply into the etymology to find out The Truth - as there's no risk
    of being vilified for using the word as anything but a term of abuse
    (as there is with say `twat' or `berk). It's interesting that John
    Lennon used `git' to rhyme with `cigarette', which says something
    about Scouse phonemes.
    
    b

    	I don't have *any* dictionary here, let alone a good one (I'm in
    the office for a change), but it might be connected with the French
    "gitane" and English "gypsy", both of which come from the probably
    mistaken belief that these dark skinned mysterious travellers
    originated in Egypt.

    re: .27, and they probably came bringing their pregnant camels with
    them ;-)

    Re .23
    
    > I knew the ammonites were around the
    > same time as the trilobites, which ... looked like they had
    > compound eyes.
    
    DrDan, you pretty much missed this one.  Ammonites were abundant in the
    Mesozoic Era (225 million to 65 million years ago); trilobites lived in
    the Paleozoic (>225 million years ago).  They overlapped but "same time
    as" stretches the point a little.  Ammonites were similar to the modern
    chambered nautilus but were not related to it.

    Doesn't the phrase "an old nun's twat" appear somewhere in Browning,
    placed there by the poet in the happy belief, instilled in him by some
    other (rogueish) poet, that the twat was a piece of the nun costume?
    

    Aieee, well the ammonite WAS right next to the trilobite in my kids'
    old encyclopedia...  I fear that "right next to" subsumed a multitude
    of aeons... Tnx for the pedantry, you're right, we're in the right
    place! :)
    

    I recall that git is another word for pimp, but has an added
    disparaging or insulting quality to it.
    
    Another word with similar meaning, i.e. brothel keeper or whoremonger,
    is hollier, sometimes spelt hollyer.  Personally, I'm not thrilled
    about this.
    
    Right now I can't check in my dictionary as it's a 4.5 hr flight away. 
    But wait 'til Monday :-)
    
    Nick
    (full name -- Nicholas Charles Hollyer HILL)

Hello and Greetings,

Another thing that has puzzled me about American English is tea. When an 
American offers tea with "cream or lemon", do they REALLY mean cream? 
Blecch!


Chele

>When an American offers tea with "cream or lemon", do they REALLY mean cream?
    
    I think so.  They make cream available for coffee, so they do the same
    for tea.  If they argue that it's all the same, make a tape recording.
    Then pay with Australian dollars and play back the tape recording :-)

re <<< Note 1085.35 by JIT081::DIAMOND "$ SET MIDNIGHT" >>>

>    Then pay with Australian dollars and play back the tape recording :-)

You don't LIKE our dollars? But they're such pretty colours :^)
(the plastic ones don't wash very well though)

Chele

    There's a hotel in LA which certainly mean cream.
    
    They thought I was mad when I asked for milk.
    
    They thought I was really out of my tree when I insisted on tea, rather
    than camomile or raspberry leafs or several other alternatives.
    
    For them tea was hot water (not boiling either) and dried leaves.
    
    Nick

    .38
    
    > -< I LIKE (black) tea with cream. >-
    
    Blech.  And more blech.  "Herbal" teas are bad enough, but diluting tea
    with anything except milk or, as needed, boiling water is right out.  I
    think Americans must have gotten the idea from reading about an English
    tradition called "cream tea"...
    
    I order loose teas by air post from Fortnum & Mason in Piccadilly.

	.39  Hang it up, Richard, you could have an official tea cosy
	made by the queen mother herself, and you'd never convince the
	Brits that you can make a good cup of tea in the States. ;>

	By the way, I hate it with cream too.

	Di

I'll join the chorus!  Tea with cream .... ughhhh!

Mind you cream here is usually a "half and half" cream ... which roughly equates
to something slightly richer than gold top milk ...

But this stuff isn't particularly nicve in coffee either.

There are two things that are worse ...

Tea with cream, where the cream is actually a liquid form of coffee mate!

Tea on a N. Am. airline where they've never HEARD of milk ... so you get
tea with a little packet of coffee creamer ... double blechhhhh!

You're right, tea in the US is made with hot water (and sometimes not
very hot either!) ... but what is worse ... it is really hard to make
good tea in Colorado (in the mountains) where due to altitude water boils
at under 200 degrees F 

Mind you talking about not finding good tea in the USA ... even respectable
coffee is hard to find!

Stuart

    Based on all the English tea cannisters I've read, I've always thought
    that the water wasn't *supposed* to be boiling -- close, yes, but not
    quite boiling.
    
    According to the directions, boiling water was insipid.

	Yes, Andrew, according to the anxiety-provoking directions
	I was once given by a bona fide native of old England, it
	would seem that you have about a seven-second window to play
	with, before which the water's too hot, and after which you've
	completely blown it and might as well wait until the
	following afternoon.
  

    G'day,
    
    .... and OF COURSE, the milk MUST be in the cup when the Tea is
    poured... stops the milk scalding...
    
    Mind you, this is for indian tea... chinese tea should be drunk black.
    
    
    derek 

re<<< Note 1085.44 by AUSSIE::WHORLOW "Bushies do it for FREE!" >>>
                               -< milk first!! >-

>    .... and OF COURSE, the milk MUST be in the cup when the Tea is
>    poured... stops the milk scalding...
    
I had this argument with my father-in-law yesterday. His argument was that 
"Julius Sumner-Milliner (sp?) siad that the milk should go in last!"
My argument was that J.S-M probably made a lousy cuppatea.


Chele

Oh no, I have Monday-fingers. 

    
    This is the first time I've heard of a Brit specifying anything but a
    rolling boil for making tea (steeping takes between 2.5 and 3.0
    minutes). Putting the milk in first is to prevent those very delicate
    porcelain cups from cracking when hot tea hits.
    
    Sometimes Americans, when offered milk or lemon, will ask for both --
    and then complain when the milk curdles.
    
    JP

    From my experience...
    
    A rolling boil is correct.  As the boiling water is poured from the
    kettle into the pot, it is cooled by contact with the air and reduced
    to a temperature just below the boiling point.  This is the proper
    temperature.
    
    Tea should be steeped between 2:30 and 3:30 minutes, depending on the
    variety.  For instance, Darjeeling becomes tannic if steeped more than
    2:40, but Russian Caravan does not develop its fullest flavour if
    steeped less than 3:10.  Irish Breakfast should go the full 3:30 so it
    can knock you up mentally.
    
    Good tea cannot be made from teabags; loose tea is required.  The stuff
    produced by teabags is an inderior substitute, acceptable only when
    better is not available.  Part of the quality problem is that teabag
    tea is broken more finely so it will release its essence quicker.  As a
    result, it fails to develop the desired depth of flavour, instead
    becoming tannic or muddy if brewed for what should be the proper time.

    If you add milk to tea then the temperature of the first few drops of
    milk is raised fast enough and high enough to curdle it.  This changes
    the flavour of the drink.
    
    If you put the milk in first then the temperature is raised more
    slowly, and the overheating of the first few drops is avoided.  And
    yes, an additional benefit is that it doesn't damage fine porcelain.
    
    For India and Ceylon teas - milk in first and one small spoon of sugar
    please.  For Russian tea - no milk and one large spoon of sugar please.

    BLYGHT::JOYOFTEA
    
    Thank you so much for this favour.
    
    :-)
    

I'm sure this has been entered in this conference numerous times, but I 
thought it might be just the thing to reorient this topic. It just goes to 
show that language mangling goes both ways.

>From "American Demographics" magazine:  Here's a look at how shrewd
American business people translate their slogans into foreign languages.


When Braniff translated a slogan touting its upholstery, "Fly in
leather," it came out in Spanish as "Fly naked."


Coors put its slogan, "Turn it loose," into Spanish, where it was read as
"Suffer from diarrhea."


Chicken magnate Frank Perdue's line, "It takes a tough man to make a
tender chicken," sounds much more interesting in Spanish:  "It takes a
sexually stimulated man to make a chicken affectionate."


When Vicks first introduced its cough drops on the German market, they
were chagrined to learn that the German pronunciation of "v" is f - which
in German is the gutteral equivalent of "sexual penetration."


Not to be outdone, Puffs tissues tried later to introduce its product,
only to learn that "Puff" in German is a colloquial term for a
whorehouse.  The English weren't too fond of the name either, as it's a
highly derogatory term for a non-heterosexual.


The Chevy Nova never sold well in Spanish speaking countries.  "No va"
means "it doesn't go" in Spanish.


When Pepsi started marketing its products in China a few years back, they
translated their slogan, "Pepsi Brings You Back to Life" pretty
literally.  The slogan in Chinese really meant, "Pepsi Brings Your
Ancestors Back from the Grave."


When Coca-Cola first shipped to China, they named the product something
that when pronounced sounded like "Coca-Cola."  The only problem was that
the characters used meant "Bite the wax tadpole."  They later changed to
a set of characters that mean "Happiness in the mouth."


A hair products company, Clairol, introduced the "Mist Stick", a curling
iron, into Germany only to find out that mist is slang for manure.  Not
too many people had use for the manure stick.


When Gerber first started selling baby food in Africa, they used the same
packaging as here in the USA - with the cute baby on the label.  Later
they found out that in Africa companies routinely put pictures on the
label of what's inside since most people can't read.

    Re .-1
    But what's that got to do with tea anyway?
    
    Everyone knows the best way to make tea is to put a tea-bag in a
    mug of cold water, and stick it in the microwave for 12.5 seconds.
    [This idea isn't my own, I own. Bob Marotta told me it on a writing
    course; a previous student had supplied it as `Instructions for
    making a cup of tea' - long-establighed writing test.]
    
    b
    

re .52:

But don't the little staples cause sparks?

    Not enough sparks to worry about...

    Most modern reactors can handle some metal - some can even cook foods
    in the aluminum-foil pans that TV dinners are sold in.

    ... as in "tick-tick-tick goes the Geiger counter??" :-)
    
    P'raps I should evacuate when my cheese does a meltdown?
    

    .56
    
    Nuclear ractors emit gamma radiation.  The only difference between
    gamma radiation and the microwave radiation used in microwave ovens is
    the energy of the photons.  Hence, the word "reactor" is an accurate
    description, sort of...  :-)

    Re .51:  Nice try.  ESW

    This topic has sure re-energized the conference.
    Now how's that for a glowing review?

re <<< Note 1085.59 by JIT081::DIAMOND "$ SET MIDNIGHT" >>>

>    Now how's that for a glowing review?

DON'T mention the 'R' word!

    Actually, one of those ovens is just a Magic BOX