What are your pet peeves re English usage?

Clary wrote:

HATE clock shifting, quite unnecessary, you can't make more light in the day just by changing the bloody clocks!

I would hate hearing savings in this context too. Mind you I always wonder why Americans say New YearS.

The changing of the clocks chiefly benefits retail sales and the "leisure industry."

As for the New Year--you're displaying an all too typical English ignorance of American usage. Some Americans, and by no means all, say "Happy New Years"--while most say "Happy New Year." Many (probably most, or nearly all) say "New Year's Eve," as though it were a possessive.

But as is so often the case with English objections to Americanisms--they are idiosyncratic and selective. The fact of the matter is that 300,000,000 Americans speak this language, and have as much right to use it as they please as do the 50 or 60 million sour pusses in your parochial little island.

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Oh yeah says who, pruneface?

:wink:

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So, Americanisms bother youse guys so much, yer gonna drop magic and music, and start using Magick and Musick again, huh?

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Nah! Too commercial. Like begging.

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If we can talk about American idiom for a moment (or longer), I get a lot of good stuff from "The Sopranos". For instance, "he got his smarts" sounds very odd to me, and I don't know where it comes from.

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Piffka wrote:

I wonder if the ubiquitious thanks is a signal in the news biz? I've heard of these before on other news shows... special key phrases for on-camera changes. The thank-you may be a sign-off so that the camera moves to a different newscaster.

Only problem with this is that I was speaking of radio, not TV. Still might be a signal to the engineer, I suppose. But my gripe isn't that the newsperson simply thanks the guest. It's the "very much indeed" that I object to. After all, all the guest did was answer a couple of questions, frequently to further his/her own agenda anyway.

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As for this nonsense called Daylight Saving Time, I applaud Walter's suggestion of changing it to Daylight Shifting Time. That's all we do -- shift; we don't save a damned thing. In fact, now that it's been decided that "standard time" will be observed for only four months, it seems ludicrous to refer to it as standard. It seems to be that the Summer hours have now become the standard.

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Clary wrote:

Mind you I always wonder why Americans say New YearS.

Why are you guys so defensive? I only wondered why.

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Merry Andrew wrote:

It seems to be that the Summer hours have now become the standard.

I know it! Seems silly. And why bother with the shift when there is no savings? I'd prefer my time be left alone...

[size=7] (grumble, grumble, grumble) I'll be over my grump in about a week.... or so. [/size]

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What I really can't understand is how the US and Europe can change on different dates this year (sure it's happened before, too).

Europeans don't change until the last weekend in March, like every year - why can't the UN (or something like it Rolling Eyes

) be used to agree a date for change.

Surely, millions will be lost and many hours wasted as a result of trans-Atlantic confusion.

Peeve over, even if it's not a language one.

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Very good peeve, kp, one of the best.

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In fact, not even all Americans fall for that line of crap. The entire state of Indiana ignores the time change, as do some municipalities. There are also areas in Canada which ignore the time change (at least one entire province, i believe, but don't quote me).

I blame the Angle-ish--but just to keep the pot on the boil.

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Clary wrote:

Very good peeve, kp, one of the best.

I thank you <bow> Laughing

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When proper illumination comes in in place of this natural rubbish we have to put up with, like down a mine or the underground, The UN will probably regulate a global standard into being and then we won't have to stay up half the night to watch Test matches in Australia and we'll be able to see American political speeches and discussion programmes so that our kids can start learning some two and three syllable words and the skill of looking dignified when talking nonsense.

It's only a question of reflective mirrors and proper area lighting anyway which scientist could easy do if only they would concentrate on where we are going instead of where we've come from.

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Setanta wrote:

In fact, not even all Americans fall for that line of crap. The entire state of Indiana ignores the time change, as do some municipalities. There are also areas in Canada which ignore the time change (at least one entire province, i believe, but don't quote me).

I blame the Angle-ish--but just to keep the pot on the boil.

Hawaii's another state that has never adopted the daylight shift nonsense. I never know whether I'm six or seven hours ahead of that state. If I remember correctly, Arizona's another one.

But the upshot is that it's never actually caused any serious confusion that I know of. It's easy enough to determine quickly whether the difference between GMT and EST is five or six hours.

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As i pointed out earlier, this benefits chiefly retail sales operations, and to a much lesser extent, "leisure industry" operations. All the claims that people make about energy savings are hotly disputed--largely because they are based on peak-use electric consumption, and changing the clocks of course changes which hours are defined as peak-use.

So often, it is claimed that this is done for the farmers (farmers don't care about it, and many object--they are sunrise to sunset workers in most cases anyway, so what time you claim it is means nothing to someone who gets busy when the sun rises); or that it is done to keep children from waiting for school buses in the dark--but in winter, children frequently are waiting for the bus in the dark at both ends, and i know of no one who has ever suggested shortening school hours to account for available daylight.

In the 19th and the early 20th century, people did not even agree on "time zones," never mind such a concept as "daylight savings." Once again, the only plausible and undeniable beneficiaries from such policies are those in retail industries.

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And retail industries are, in commercial nations, by far the largest employers of labour and thus it is a matter of common approval that they will dictate what happens.

They are currently engaged on extirpating Sundays, Holy days and the peace and quiet over the land traditionally brought on by darkness which will of course render existence into a vast soulless plain of continuous and unremitting boredom for which ever more exciting and useless palliatives will be sought which will inevitably result in you all disappearing up your own arseholes. Head first.

Bring back Bishops. They always know what time it is.

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Every member of the force
Has a watch and chain, of course
If you want to know the time, ask a p'liceman

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Times change:

Quote:

DST Dawns in Indiana. Until April 2005, when Indiana passed a law agreeing to observe daylight saving time, the Hoosier state had its own unique and complex time system. Not only is the state split between two time zones, but until recently, only some parts of the state observed daylight saving time while the majority did not. Under the old system, 77 of the state's 92 counties were in the Eastern time zone but did not change to daylight time in April. Instead they remained on standard time all year. That is, except for two counties near Cincinnati, Ohio, and Louisville, Ky., which did use daylight time. But the counties in the northwest corner of the state (near Chicago) and the southwestern tip (near Evansville), which are in the central time zone, used both standard and daylight time.

Which made it a lot of fun trying to figure out what time is was on your way to the Indianapolis 500 in May. If you were supposed to meet your cousins at noon at the Stucky's just East of the city, you had a fifty-fifty chance that one group or the other wouldn't have the time of day.

Joe(I just wore two watchs)Nation

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The entire Indiana brouhaha is an example in microcosm of how these things used to be done. In the 19th century, if there were any standardization at all, it came from the railroads. I don't have a citation for this, and am not sufficiently seized of the issue to bother to find it--but i recall reading that the railroads initially opposed using "daylight savings time" because it would play hell with their timetables, and entail a large cost to reprint schedules, which were very complex and therefore expensive to print.

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What are your pet peeves re English usage?

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