On 07/14/2010 10:45 PM, Bob Estes wrote: > On 07/14/2010 07:18 PM, NoOp wrote: ... > >> OK... take me to hospital. :-) > This is another good example of the differences between UK and US > English. In the US one would say "Take me to a hospital." or "Take me > to the hospital." To us, leaving out the article sounds funny. > > However, one can have a lot of fun with the differences. For example: > In the UK you might tell a girl, "I'll pop around in the morning and > knock you up." Meaning that you will go to her place and knock on the > door.
Just don't offer her a napkin :-) > In the US to knock a girl up means to make her pregnant. You can > imagine the different reactions you would get from a girl in the US or a > girl in the UK. Offer the US girl a serviette :-) [Way OT] Was in a meeting in Australia many years ago negotiating a contract. Office girl brought in sandwiches & female US sales rep asked the office girl for a 'napkin'. Embarrassed office girl went out & fetched one from her purse & quietly handed it to the US sales rep under the conference table... > > Idioms like this also complicate the tasks of a grammar checker. @Rob Clement: http://ethnicity.rutgers.edu/~jlynch/Writing/p.html#punctuation http://www.grammarbook.com/punctuation/quotes.asp http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/577/01/ I know the problem well :-) I am American, but spent over 20 years travelling & living in Asia. Lived in Hong Kong, Singapore, Australia, Japan etc., and always get bits mixed up. I prefer 'flavour' to 'flavor', but never have figured out why the Brits pronounce the River Thames as 'Tims'. I often wonder if I should install a 'grammar chequer' or 'grammer checker'... :-) http://grammar.about.com/od/spelling/a/spellcheck.htm --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [email protected] For additional commands, e-mail: [email protected]
