So trivial, yet it really ticks you off.

[GHT]

Btw LizzieMaine,
Un âne au collège est toujours seulement un âne.
Désole d’ entendre parler de votre mauvaise expérience.

Clever quote. Un âne means a donkey, but it can also mean an Ass, as in Jackass or Dumbass.

Ian Drury fan, GHT? Very cool. "Sex and Drugs and Rock and Roll" One never knows, do one?

Ian Drury fan? Me? On the contrary, I'm so much more at the melodious end of the musical spectrum.
Drury was struck down by polio, his difficulties, his pain and his frustration I share. I had a close relative with cerebral palsy, coping with both the difficulties of that, and the way society at large seemed so prejudiced by it, was never easy.

 

[tonyb]

I think there's a difference between "manners," which are empty formalities that tend to be learned by rote -- don't talk with your mouth full, use this fork to eat that dish, pass the plate to your left, etc. -- and just general *kindness*. Some of the biggest jackasses I've ever met have been polite-by-rote, but they don't give a damn about other people *as people,* they're only concerned with being proper to the extent that it makes them look good. The converse is also true -- some of the kindest people I've ever known wipe their mouths on their sleeves and belch loudly in the middle of a conversation.

A lot of the vogue for volunteerism today is out of selfish rather than selfless motives -- kids are taught that volunteering looks good on a resume, rather than being taught that the very structure of society is built on the moral obligation of people to help each other. Without acknowledging moral obligation, it's all just empty pretense.

I'm reminded of the more recent arrivals to my old neighborhood in Seattle who are given to self-congratulatory talk about how they treasure the "diversity" of the district.

People who talk in such ways are almost exclusively white. Their very presence in the neighborhood displaces much of that diversity they so treasure. Seriously, the district is much, much paler, and much, much more expensive, than it was when I first landed there.

I don't know if all that "diversity" talk is rooted in ignorance (willful ignorance, maybe?) or lack of self-awareness or what. But I know its effect, which is to gloss over what they are actually doing. Empty talk, is what it is.

 

[LizzieMaine]

We get the same sort here, only it's "quaintness" they value. The only people who go around saying MAINE THE WAY LIFE SHOULD BE are people who weren't born here, and got their notions of small-town life from Disneyland.

 

[Bamaboots]

Ian Drury fan? Me? On the contrary, I'm so much more at the melodious end of the musical spectrum.
Drury was struck down by polio, his difficulties, his pain and his frustration I share. I had a close relative with cerebral palsy, coping with both the difficulties of that, and the way society at large seemed so prejudiced by it, was never easy.

GHT, I can appreciate that. I'm aware of Drury's difficulties. His is just not a name one sees around here very often. I couldn't resist.

 

[Harp]

-->Tokyo + Nikon Photomic FTN = Not going “meshuggah” --> “nam !

Nikon=apporterait piastre a Saigon.

 

[Harp]

Aujourd’hui, peut-être. Mais â l’époque , il était considéré comme “haut de gamme” ou alors je pensais.

I
And it did help me to keep going & not break down from what was going
down all around.

The country is beautiful and the Vietnamese are wonderful.
J'ai pense de Sophia Loren.

 

[2jakes]

The country is beautiful and the Vietnamese are wonderful.
J'ai pense de Sophia Loren.

81... nice!

 

[tonyb]

We get the same sort here, only it's "quaintness" they value. The only people who go around saying MAINE THE WAY LIFE SHOULD BE are people who weren't born here, and got their notions of small-town life from Disneyland.

You worked small-town journalism at one time, so of course you are familiar with Joe Whosucksalltheoxygenoutoftheroom who blew into town about 10 minutes ago and knows how things ought to work around here.

Almost as annoying is the person who thinks that an idea generated by someone who doesn't have deep roots in the area is to be dismissed solely for that reason. A frequent sight here in greater Denver are bumper stickers in the style of the state license plate (the outline of a mountain range across the top) reading "NATIVE." I'm tempted to have one of my own made up, but it would read "NOT FROM HERE."

I'm not here to tell anybody that this place is better or worse than some other place I once resided. But I do know that some things are done better here than there, and vice-versa. But really, the differences are truly quite trivial (to keep with the theme of this thread), and hardly deserving of anyone to get a superior and/or defensive attitude about.

I found myself in Aspen (don't ask) for a couple-three days last month. On the local public radio station was some debate about a proposed hotel development. On one side were the people who said it is the sort of development in keeping with the spirit of the area (one of the costliest in the U.S., by the way) and others who warned that it would spell the end of the town as they know and love it. Among the latter group are those who trash-talk Vail, which is a resort town built from scratch to be a ski resort town, starting back in the early 1960s. In their minds, Vail is decidedly de classe is comparison to Aspen, which had a fairly long history before the surrounding mountains got turned into a ski mecca.

 

[2jakes]

Native language belongs to the people

You say ‘to-may-to', I say ‘to-mah-to’ !

 

[GHT]

You say eggplant I say aubergine. You say jello I say jelly. You say jelly I say jam. You say gas I say petrol. You say ER I say A&E. You say aluminum I say aluminium. You say garbage I say rubbish. You say ass I say arse. You go to the bathroom I go to the loo. American ladies wear panties, over here they wear knickers. You say cookie I say biscuit. You say biscuit I say scone. You say hood I say bonnet. You say garter belt I say suspender. You say suspender I say braces. You say cane I say stick. You say stroller I say buggy. You say shopping cart I say shopping trolley. You say elevator I say lift. You say candy I say sweets. You say trailer I say caravan. You say fries I say chips. You say chips I say crisps. You pronounce clerk as it's written I pronounce it as clark. You stick a pacifier in baby's mouth I would give baby a dummy. You say apartment I say flat. You say cuffs I say turn ups. (for trouser bottoms) You close the drapes I close the curtains. You say furnace I say boiler. (as in central heating) You say semester I say term. You say sophomore I say second year. You say freshman I say first year, as in student. ( we once said fuzzer, for first year)
I won't go into the dubious ones, but look up Britspeak for fag and fanny.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I wouldn't say "drapes" if my life depended on it. A curtain is a curtain is a curtain. And that thing you push around a grocery store is a carriage or a wagon, not a cart. And when nature calls, I go to the toilet or the can. And that thing you stick in a baby's face to shut her up is a "fuddie." Underneath a house is "down cellar" -- a "basement" is a toilet in a school. And "arse" is just the same for me as it is for any of Her Majesty's subjects. New England doesn't have much truck with that weird language they speak in the rest of the country.

 

[2jakes]

According to the website Curtainworks,
there is a regionalism to what term people use.
Folks living anywhere close to a major metropolitan area...
identify soft window treatments as draperies.
If you live in the South or Midwest, you probably describe them as drapes.
if you live in the Northeast or on the West Coast, most likely you refer
to them as curtains.

The site credits Montgomery Ward with turning the verb into a noun in an 1895
catalog referring to drapery silk as being suitable for ‘sash curtains and mantle drapes.

‘Sears, Roebuck & Co. got into the verb-as-noun act in it’s 1908 catalog,
calling a Nottingham lace curtain ‘one of the most stylish and
attractive drapes one could possibly desire for the parlor window.’

Up until the 1950s, usage of the term ‘drapes’ was considered fairly low-class.
In the 1950s edition of Emily Post’s Etiquette,” she calls the term drapes as
“inexcusable vulgarism.”
Peggy McMullen, The Oregonian

 

[HoosierDaddy]

Here in kind of the heart of the midwest we, and most people I know, call unlined window dressing that are often sashed back, 'curtains'. If they are lined and in a more formal setting they are then referred to as 'drapery'.
HD

 

[swanson_eyes]

I'm from CA and have lived in the midwest for 13 years. They have always been drapes to me. It's whatever word your family uses.

 

[dh66]

Most folks I know down south use drapes and curtains both, depending on how the mood strikes them I guess.

As for the throne room....being in the trade I've heard just about every name for it conceivable.

 

[GHT]

And "arse" is just the same for me as it is for any of Her Majesty's subjects. New England doesn't have much truck with that weird language they speak in the rest of the country.

Brilliant, I really must get myself north of the Mason/Dixon and see New England. Talking of Her Majesty's subjects, did the guy who wrote a letter to the Queen, make the news on your side of the pond?

A frustrated American wrote to the Queen and asked her to take back the USA after becoming fed up with the behaviour of the republican presidential candidates - and he got a royal reply.
Presidential wannabees such as Donald Trump have been stuck firmly in the headlines recently as they try and talk their way into American hearts, not to mention insult each other while they do it.
Enough was enough for one Anglophile and he fired off a pleading letter to Her Royal Highness.
While he may not have got the answer he was looking for, it showed that Buckingham Palace had a sense of humour.

 

[GHT]

As for the throne room....being in the trade I've heard just about every name for it conceivable.

Have you come across: "The Computer Room?" It's where you go to download.

 

[GHT]

On a word reference site that I looked up, it states that it's curtains in the bedrooms and drapes in the living rooms. Then it went on; that it depended on the thickness of the material and then added that curtains become drapes when they are lined. Sounded like they made it up as they went along. For me curtain is a generic term, you have the safety curtain in a theatre, the canvas side of a truck that can be drawn back to allow forklift access is a curtain, known as a curtain-sider, then there's the shower cubicle curtain. The only use of drape that I think we use; is when you drape something around yourself, although we tend to wrap a towel around us. My wife will often say of our cat that she likes to drape herself over the cushions.

 

[LizzieMaine]

It may just be theatre slang, but the only thing we call a "drape" is a cloth draped over a table when a table appears on stage -- it's not intended to be decorative, it's intended to conceal the legs of the seated participants from the audience. That's a drape.

 

[GHT]

Polo has a preference for bamboo “blinds” !

What a beauty Polo is. At the rear of our house we have three skylight windows, they are so called because the are actually part of the roof and, when closed, are at 45%, flush with the roofline. They need a curtain pole top and bottom so that the curtains draw flush to the window. We had a cat, whom we sadly lost last year, after 20 years, old age took it's toll, China Doll. She liked nothing more than to jump up into the drawn curtain, where she would snooze in the sunshine, her personal hammock we called it, and when the weather was clement and the window open, she would climb out onto the roof. You could hear her claws scratching on the tiles as she used them to prevent herself from slipping. The skylight became know as the world's biggest cat flap.