Wonderful words

[gill216]

A jerkin to me would be a woolly jacket with sleeves.

The "sea hairs " were chairs!!!!!

[Bunnylump]

Aaaahhh!! I see!

[Laura]

Now, a frock can be a frock only if it is preceded by 'posh'. Otherwise it's a dress.

I'd set the table and (not) make the bed. And the vaccuuming needs doing.

[gill216]

While you're here Laura, whats with the yorkie "10 while 2"? I've only ever heard that in Yorkshire.

I'd say 10 until 2 - or geordie style 10 till 2.

[LAT]

I agree with Laura about the frock.

I set or lay the table. I make the bed. And yes, the vacuuming needs to be done, or needs doing. But then so does the dusting and the bathroom could do with a clean too.

In our family ample breasts are known as Welfords. (Named after a local dairy) This stems from a time when my grandmother was leaning forward and she was told to keep her Welfords off the table!! (This is from years ago, she died when I was three so I only know the story second hand)

[giraffe]

[Scurra]

There are a whole selection of words I class as "Radio 4" words. Often ones I know a large portion of the population would have trouble with, and a smaller selection that are new to me and I think "I must look that up....." but never do What annoys me about these people being interviewed is their deliberate obfuscation

I think that's a bit unfair - I don't think there's deliberate obfuscation involved on the most part. One of the most enjoyable paradoxes of English is that it is both exact and vague - we have a vast number of words, but use only a very small proportion of them in regular conversation. (Of course, this is great for those of us who write word puzzles!)

And whilst it may be arguably true that a large proportion of the population might have trouble with them, does that mean we shouldn't use them?

[MBH]

What annoys me about these people being interviewed is their deliberate obfuscation

I think that's a bit unfair - I don't think there's deliberate obfuscation involved on the most part.

LOL - I love the English languge for the reasons you say (and the fun that can be had with it), but with the risk of being political - most of the obfuscators are politicians

If I were going on national radio to speak I'd tend to use words understood by the majority of people. The fact that I can recognise words I don't know, and work out what the person is trying to say by the context means (in my mind) that they are showing off their superior vocabulary and bamboozling the listener along the way.

I still think this should be played before probing interviews (of all political colour)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCDoBvG1HoI


(This guy doesn't even have the vocabulary we're talking about)

[Scurra]

MBH, we are going to have to agree to disagree here - you interpret what they say as "showing off their superior vocabulary", whereas I just think that they are talking. They may indeed be talking bollocks, but I genuinely don't think they are showing off.

Indeed, part of the problem may be that they are trying to be too exact, and are using very precise words rather than the dangerously imprecise words that form most of our conversations!

[Laura]

While you're here Laura, whats with the yorkie "10 while 2"? I've only ever heard that in Yorkshire.

I'd say 10 until 2 - or geordie style 10 till 2.

I would have to say I've not really heard that. Around here it'd be 10 to 2. My grandparents say five-and-twenty to, rather than twenty-five to, but I think that's fairly common isn't it?

[eirian]

It's curious that I'm usually the person in our office people ask what words mean. I don't have any problem telling people that. It's actually thinking of the words in the first place I have difficulty (hence I can't do crosswords). But knowing the meaning of the words when I'm given them I can do.

I suspect a lot of the time people don't realise that other people don't understand what the words mean.

Oh, and I believe "10 while 2" means "from 10am to 2pm". At least that's what I always assumed my Oldham colleague meant by it - I think it must have slipped over the border into Lancashire, but only as far as Oldham.

[Laura]

Yep. That's just me being slack! If you're talking about 10am until 2pm, you'd say 10 while 2. Dunno why. But they say a load of funny things in Yorkshire. Even the kids I teach in Sheffield don't know what I'm on about sometimes, and when we went to the mining museum, which is here in Wakefield, I had to translate. "Boy-its", is the best phoenetic spelling I can come up with, of one of the words they came out with, and okkerwatter is another. Any ideas on those???

[MBH]

MBH, we are going to have to agree to disagree here - you interpret what they say as "showing off their superior vocabulary", whereas I just think that they are talking.

No problem with that my friend - we call it as we see it.

While you're here Laura, whats with the yorkie "10 while 2"? I've only ever heard that in Yorkshire.

Since my assistant at work always used the 'while' for times, I was beginning to think it was a Sunderland expression - but you've just solved the mystery. He was born and brought up in York. Never heard it from anyone else but him.


Laura - if we're heading into dialect or regional words, one of my first orders at the bar (aged 16) was a big Glaswegion wanting "A wee Carly by the neck, and a Bite o'tha Man"

[Bunnylump]

What amuses me is that Scots call bitter "heavy". And just to be really confusing they say things like "the back of 3" which appears to mean about ten past 3.

[tricia]

quite like the derogatory term TEUCHTER. It sort of means yokel / idiot and is typified (in my OH's world) by someone who has really rosy cheeks!!
.

We use teuchter to describe someone from the highlands


Tricia

[Wulfruna]

When you visit someone do you stay the night

Of course, if you are in Scotland the place where you "stay" is your permanent living address. It always confuses me to be asked "Where do you stay?"