The Pitfalls of Marrying an American Woman.

Do it for Denmark, eh?

Exactly, but you must admit there are worse duties.

Thinking about it I think there is a historical reason for using the curved side of the fork.
Under King Louis number ? life at Verseilles some rather boring so people came up with different ideas - one was to use the curved side and see how many peas or whatever you could get to stay - something like that is the story.
The use then spread to other courts and from there to noble families and then to the bourgeoisie. So we still fight with the peas on the curved fork.

If they're just doing it for the challenge, the should try it on soup.

For soup even those guys used a spoon

Thanks for that analysis, Finn.

I always say that a humour thread is not a humour thread unless someone has come along and dissected the whole thing.

Good job.

You have to ask yourself what sort of mind equates a sense of humour with being 'hip.' Have you ever come across anyone who laughs at something, not because it's funny, but because they're 'hip?'

Finn, constantly complains about the jokes on A2K, he's very good about saying what's not funny, but has yet to say what is. I can only deduce that he's spent most of his life being the butt of jokes because most jokes are beyond his comprehension, and, instead of accepting his failings, he complains about the world in general.

It's a bit like saying that scientists accept Einstein's theory of relativity, and Darwinian evolution, not because there's any truth in it, but because they want to be 'hip.'

In fact not being a 'hip' poster on A2K is something else he complains about. So far he won't say who the supposed 'hip,' posters are, just that he and JTT are not members of the 'hip' clique.

Maybe he's being incredibly ironic, seeing that 'hip' faded out of popular vernacular sometime in the mid 50s.

I've tried eating soup with a knife and fork, but no matter how good you are, and no matter how hot the soup was when served, it's always cold before you can finish it.

Someone once told me of a Cockney pie 'n mash shop they visited in the East End back in the 1950s. The tables were aluminium surface with two forks chained to the table at each place. Customers would take a fork in each hand and plough into the pie and mash, (also on a metal plate,) the minute it arrived. She said she'd never seen anything like it. Some even had it with liquor a foul green concoction that seems to have no culinary benefits at all.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pie_and_mash

I've been to one in Greenwich a few times. My Dad was born just around the corner from the observatory and liked to take us kids back there from time to time, to have a look round his old 'manor'.
He used to have liquor on his (we had ordinary gravy) and I tried it once.
It was a weak, fishy taste and didn't sit right with my kiddy taste buds.

The pie and mash was great though. Especially with loads of ketchup, to make the mash all pink.

Just down the road, we walked past a big old pub and my Dad told us that was where the dockers used to drink and that there was always a fight kicking off in the bar.
Just as he said it, the pub door slammed open and two big men rolled out, followed by a cheering crowd.
Dad discreetly turned us three boys around and we walked off in the opposite direction. He had a wry smile on his face for a while, and I think it was because he suddenly felt on familiar home turf again.

I remember a pub fight where two big blokes were knocking merry hell out of each other, all the time a woman was screaming. 'It's all right, they're brothers.'

They kept going for about five minutes, then went back to drinking. They didn't get thrown out or anything.

Happy days.

I found I can cut just about anything with the edge of a fork if I press hard enough. Soup is no problem. I just drink from the bowl.

They weren't called Ronnie and Reg were they?

(Claim to fame......I sat in on an interview with Reg once)

I never noticed, but I also do the same
It must be funny for someone to watch me...

I think Finn may be a hipster.

They object to smiling and laughing. It's a matter of style. Cuffed skinny leg pants, porkpie hats, ironic buns on men, no laughing or smiling in public.

You leave Finn alone!

If it wasn't for him, no-one would understand what this thread was all about.

You are a horrid horrid man.

You made me laugh out loud at work.

How would you have treated my friend Perez lordy?

I'm thinking you would have run off shrieking into the night?

Or would you have thought "Hey, dinner!"

"How would you have treated my friend Perez lordy?....."

Seriously? ........and I am a bit of an embarrassment sometimes....I would go out of my way (subtly, of course) to strike up a conversation with him if he was in a pub. Firstly, I love talking to people from other countries, even if sometimes it is nearly all hand signals and giggling.
Secondly, if I'm talking to someone in that situation on my home turf, I love answering their questions and then suggesting places to go or stay.

We once put up a couple of Czech newlyweds who we'd met in our local pub.
They were staying in the nearby hotel, but England had proved far more expensive than they thought it would be, and they were fast running out of money.
What are ya gonna do? Newlyweds? Skint? Rationing their money so they could survive to the end of the week?

They checked out and moved into our spare room. Most people here would do the same. Over the next week, we drove them round London and showed them the stuff tourists never usually get to see. We drove them down to Portsmouth (90 mins away) to see the Mary Rose exhibition, as that was on their 'to do' list, and drove them down to Heathrow when their departure day came.

I don't think many Brits would think twice about befriending a foreigner, as long as that person wanted to be friends, of course.
Those of us who live in built up areas are living in and around people from other countries all of the time. There are tensions when peolle don't want to integrate sometimes, as tgere are tensions anywhere around the world where that happens, but on the whole, we are a pretty friendly bunch as long as it is reciprocated.

My neighbours on my side of the road, looking left, in sequence.....next door, Austrian 85 year old. She used to fire ak ak at the RAF as they flew over...married a Brit soldier and came home with him.
Next family....local born and bred....next, Romanians...very funny, lovely kids, next...Pakistani, professional couple, posh car no kids yet, very smiley
.next...Policeman, German wife...had them round for dinner and vice versa many times....next...old lady, a bit barmy.
The other way....single guy, nice but quiet, next...Sikh family, he's a teacher who can drink me under the table, next....Irish lady, fsntastic gardener...

During the Queen's jubilee, we had a street party and signed a book which went with others to the local library.
In my street of 130 houses, we had people from over twenty countries attend.

I'm not that old. If I remember rightly Ronnie was in Broadmoor and Reggie in Parkhurst at the time.

Later on the Landlord threatened to bar me for shouting out something about Bourbon Street New Orleans during a Jazz concert.

Fighting doesn't get you barred, but showing your appreciation of Jazz does.

I wouldn't have minded being barred if it wasn't such a dump.