Plain Stupid

British Speak On this Side of the Pond

As many of you know, I am British Expatriate living in the USA. I’ve lived here long enough to be quite familiar with the majority of differences between the cultures. I still find myself translating UK English to American English in my mind before speaking. However, in the main I use American terms when in American company, although, I’ve still got quite a thick British accent.

A lot of the differences are very subtle and it’s only after living here for so long that I am attuned to them. For example, we Brits tend to use a lot of words in a sentence. I know that sounds a bit far-fetched, but I can assure you that it’s quite true.

When I first came over I would order food at fast food restaurants with a “May I have veggie burger with French fries, please and I would also like to have a large drink as well”. Too many words! My American friends would say, “Hyacinth, just say, I’ll have a veggie burger with fries and a large drink”. I would say that’s just plain stupid and in my opinion, they should employ staff that can understand more than one way of speaking!

I believed that my accent was at fault and to a degree it was a part of being frequently misunderstood. Seeing as I was not going to get my way and have the entire fast food industry in America, train their staff to understand me, I decided to shorten up my sentences and cut out a lot of the niceties. And of course, I had less difficulty communicating.

Then I went through a phase where I thought that I would just be myself and to hell with being clear and understandable. I soon came to the realization that was too extreme. Using British phrases such as, “What are you like?” and “I don’t give a toss”, just cause a lot of confusion. (You can find the meaning to these British Sayings on BritSlang.com). So I found a happy medium and so ends this little anecdote.

I just decided that I would be clear when I have to deal with people who are strangers but be myself around those who really know me. My partner is used to my little British Sayings and occasionally takes the mickey but I can give as good as I get.

Check out one of my other sites, which is a dictionary of British Sayings and Slang Words. Let me know what you think!

Do you believe in Redemption?

I am a true believe in redemption. I think that the majority of humans are not evil, per se, and can be reformed to an extent. This may be true in my mind for certain murderers and even sex offenders.

However a recent news story out of Kentucky tells of a child sex offender being ordained as a church minister. “How?” and “why?” are the words that immediately come to mind. In my view placing this man in a position where he will invariably come into contact with children, is tantamount to condoning the offense.

I am convinced that he is probably remorseful and has “found Christ” in his head but why allow him the opportunity to rescind back into his past acts? Isn’t this an irresponsible act coming from a place where people expect the highest level of trust and protection.?

Anyway, let me know your thoughts on this matter. It’s troubling and perhaps more detrimental than just plain stupid.

Girl for Sale…

So the newspaper advert should have read, such was the stupidity of one father. It happened in India, where a father put his daughter up as a wager in a card game and lost! The winner dragged off the girl, despite her vehement protests and whilst family onlookers tried in vain to stop him.

Gambling is illegal in India, so shouldn’t this make the verbal contract, “wager”, null and void? We might need a few lawyers to sort this one out.

Luckily, neighbors in her village heard the story and rescued her from a tortuous situation. Level heads have prevailed.

Who would have thought children were bargaining chips. Just plain stupid.

The Twitter Prayer

Lately Twitter seems to be all the rage.  Everyone is “tweeting” even etaBlog “tweets”. People T.W.I. ( Tweet While Intoxicated) instead of cell phone “drunk dialing”.

These are just some of the awesome things we do with technology!  etaBlog has written the Twitter version of the “Lord’s Prayer” or what we call the “Twitter Prayer”.

The Twitter Prayer

Ah Twitter, are thou my heaven,
hallowed be thy name.
Twitter has come,
thy will be done,
on internet as it is in heaven
Give us a tweet our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive those who haven’t followed us.
And spam us is the temptation,
but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom, the power and the glory. for ever and ever. Tweet again.

Plain Stupid

What would the world be like without things to make us smile or think, “what were they thinking?” We could probably have made an entire site devoted to this topic but we know that some things are better taken in small doses. You’ll find quirky stories, funny pictures and even some out of the ordinary video footage here.