Fine-Tuning 15, British English/American English

re. paternoster/banned:
Central European paternoster lift threatened with extinction

[quote="write 'cheque' when one means 'check' is just too, too French for me.[/quote]

check is to make sure all is well - as in check up on something

Cheque is a form of payment

logical reason for different spellings because they have different origins

[quote="Roberta"]Walter, Just when I find what paternosters are, they're banned! Are they dangerous? quote]

yes!

there were quite a few accidents where a compartment fell of the chains and like a pack of cards, it knocks all the others off as it falls down the shaft

We had them at my university and they regularly got stuck because dopey students would jump into them carrying a huge canvas painting that was too big - oops!!

Vivien -- I had, in fact, thought of that distinction between 'check' and 'cheque' as I was typing. But there are many words in our language which mean quite distinct things, depending entirely on their position in a sentence, and yet we still maintain identical spellings. Spelling. Yes, well, we had a real bad spell of whether recently. Oh, did I spell that correctly?

So Roberta, you've now add another liguistic string to your bow.
Very often the 2nd word of an item of rhyming slag is dropped off in day to day speech. Hence frog & toad = road, becomes simply, frog

So take a butcher's at this short piece if you wish & see what you can make of it.

I had to take my saucepan downtown today and get a new nanny, a pair of daisys plus a couple of dicky dirts. New school term starts soon, Well that lot cost a lot of bees, a lot more than a lady godiva I'll tell yer. Gettin' the old jam jar parked was a bit dicey and the amount of bird it took buyin' the stuff for the old boy was ages. I needed a pimple & blotch and Bud by the neck afterwards. The saucepan just had a coke. Then of course I met this lemon, he's an old china of mine in fact, so I stayed for a drop of 2nds, which then became 3rds. When we got back to the pope, the the duchess had the 'ump well and truly. Strewth I got a right tongue lashing and some serious GBH of the old lug 'oles.
That means no slap & tickle for me for at least a bubble.

Reckon you can translate it Roberta

http://www.peevish.co.uk/slang/

Interesting thing, John. I understood most of that even though in some places I can't think of what the substitute rhyming word is that you've omitted.

Hi Andrew, yes as a paragraph you can find certain clues so that it can be understood.

I had to take my saucepan lid == kid downtown today and get a new nanny goat == coat, a pair of daisys roots == boots plus a couple of dicky dirts == shirts. New school term starts soon, Well that lot cost a lot of bees & honey == money , a lot more than a lady godiva == a fiver, £5 note, I'll tell yer. Gettin' the old jam jar == car parked was a bit dicey and the amount of bird lime == time it took buyin' the stuff for the old boy was ages. I needed a pimple & blotch == scotch and Bud by the neck afterwards. The saucepan just had a coke. Then of course I met this lemon squeezer == geezer == man , he's an old china plate == mate == pal of mine in fact, so I stayed for a drop of 2nds, which then became 3rds. When we got back to the pope of rome == home, the the duchess of fife == wife had the 'ump well and truly. Strewth I got a right tongue lashing and some serious GBH of the old lug 'oles.
That means no slap & tickle for me for at least a bubble.

Make sence Andrew ? Of course you can use it and leave no clues and make impossible to follow it, without a good level of knowledge

I missed butcher's == butcher's hook == look


bubble and squeek == week

Walt, this is English public school* slang from the late 19th century, or before the Great War at any rate, when it was 'rather jolly' to diminish everything and add -er on the end. As in "rugger" for rugby football, so "soccer" for Association Football.

*Public school (Eng)= very private school (US)

A 'dog' is a phone, I thought we had made that perfectly Brighton (Pier)

And a 'fanny' is a vagina in Glasgow, I can confirm, which fact was the source of many a merry joke when I was a schoolboy.

(Example: Minister in pulpit, preaching fire and brimstone sermon:
"That man over there, he was so involved in drinking, he even called his daughter Sherry!
"That one, he loved his gambling and money so much, he called his daughter Penny!
Man to young woman sitting beside him "Come on Fanny, let's get out of here!)

Interesting, that. I will admit to prior ignorance of that particular useage of 'fanny.' In the US it always means the buttocks and isn't considered particularly pffensive or lewd.

Vivien, I LOVE your new avatar. LOVE it!!! I'm green with envy.

oldandknew, I'm glad I kept reading before I tried to figure out what that paragraph meant. It was too advanced for a novice like me. I was lost, lost, lost. Thanks for the translation.

McTag, I'm glad you found your way here. You raise a point that has always confused me. If English public schools are the equivalent of US private schools, then what are public-public schools called? I mean the kind of schools that are free and for the masses.

Ah Roberta, you need not be a novice for long, help is at hand.
Take a gander at the sites below and much will be revealed

http://www.cockneyrhymingslang.co.uk/default.asp

http://www.peevish.co.uk/slang/

Thank you for those links, John. I had,in fact, the rhymingslang site saved among 'my favorites' (no 'u' ) at one time. But they sem to have changed their URL or something. It won't come up now from that particular filing cabinet. So I'm grateful to have a new version.

Speaking of (not 'in') slang, here's a nearly complete list:
A Dictionary Of Slang

Roberta - glad you like the avatar!

state schools is what normal schools are called, then there are private schools that are fee paying but don't have that extra status of the public schools (very high fee paying) - which are old established and people put the baby's name down at birth to get into them!

Adding a little bit to Vivien's piece: (can you say that in America?)

OK, if you were a child of a well-to-do or aristocratic family in the 14th or 15th centuries in England, how did you get your education? (There were no schools, and travel was difficult and dangerous.) Daddy arranged a private tutor for you, that's how. Like the Clerk of Oxenford in the Canterbury Tales, something like that, or a poor curate. He came to your castle or manor house (or he lived there full-time), and taught you Latin and Greek, and maybe some more. This was obviously limiting.

As population and wealth increased, so the 'public schools' came into being, still for the privileged classes, as they remain largely to this day.
Famous among those, Eton, Harrow, Winchester, Rugby, etc

These venerable institutions predated a state school system by several centuries. (in some cases) I believe Henry VIII was instrumental in founding some, presumably to reduce the influence of Church teaching.

I'm not sure what y'all mean by state schools, but here, they are known as public schools--meaning the burden of their support is from some form of taxation. They are generally supported from a county or school district's general revenue fund, which is raised by property taxes, and sometimes from a portion of the sales tax, as well as ordinary administrative fees. They would not be self-sufficient from those sources, however, and receive state and federal aid.