Americanisms!

anno it would have been about 50 years ago, so maybe names have been changed now!

I've had some funny conversations with American ladies on another forum concerning pants/panties and trousers pants = trousers not knickers as in the UK..

I'm reminded of that wonderful line from The Road to Morocco - "like Webster's Dictionary, we're Morocco bound"

Pantyhose seems such a clumsy word. Tights sounds much better.

Same problems were around in 1949....a glossary list in my dad's diary when he went to the US on business! (sidewalk = pavement, etc...)

They don't have 'Road' films on the telly these days do they? Used to love them.

Ana pantyhose - ugh, panties double ugh

Tegan loved the anagram comment, so true

Gracesmum OH reluctantly accepts your Humph Davy (having immediately engaged phone to check - he did mutter something about some Danish guy but I floored him with dates - he did counter though with his correct pronunciation of Berkshire and Belvoir and even threw in a Shrewsbury for good measure. I was stumped. I did assure him, the English aren't anal, we've always adapted language and we don't assume we are 'right'

My DS ex girlfriend shocked my elderly mum by saying she hated pants and never wore them..

The ex was surprised herself when DH said how much he liked faggots

susieb

!!

Yoga I think cup cakes have spread over here. I heard them described as 'fairy cakes with attitude'

Sometimes we really can misunderstand each other, I mean Americans and English.

I was once on a tram in Vienna with a fellow student, an American. I had a new handbag and a tatty old purse, so when she said "I like your purse" I was flummoxed. We sorted that one out, then she went on to say she also had a very old pocket book. "What book" I asked. She explained that it isn't a book, it is what the English call a purse.

At that point we gave up and morphed into German. At least we both spoke the same version of that language!

I think we are all more knowlegable about each others different dialects these days - I generally understand what Americans mean, 'cos we are exposed to so much of it. Sometimes, though, their demotion of the letter T to a letter D or just a space, confuses me.

That brings back a memory, Joan. On holiday in Vienna, I teamed up with a Hungarian/American girl. After a swim, I was doing my hair, back-combing it to death as usual and she informed me that I was 'teasing' my hair.

That was in the 60s, of course. Don't think my hair would like to be back-combed now.

Oh yes - back-combing. I was lucky in that I always had short hair, as in an urchin cut - not enough to back comb. It must have caused ruined hair and split ends!

Grannyknot did you visit Hearst Castle when you drove along the PCH?

The 'castle' itself is weird but the grounds, location and views were spectacular.

And talking of fanny ..... I overheard a 70-something American tourist in London asking the shop assistant for a fanny bag so she could store her bits and pieces!

Back-combing and then squirting on lacquer from a squeezy bottle, then carefully combing the top layer before squirting again. Reminds me of sugaring the petticoat

Before my time, Movedalot...

Spring chicken Ana or just a short memory? That's usually my line to DH as he is a whole 2 1/2 years older than me.

Moved oh, the choking smell of that lacquer in the girls' cloakrooms! Did you have a foam petticoat too?

I remember the fine art of clipping a beret onto that backcombed hair too

I've just started tying my hair back or wearing it up again. Requires lacquer.

Never came across a foam petticoat, but I had one with plastic hoops in channels between the tiers. One of them came out and wound itself round my feet in the middle of a Scottish country dance.

That sounds very elegant Jeni I've never had the patience to grow my hair - I always think there are so many more options when you do. I don't think the hair spray today is anything like the industrial lacquer I remember, I could have sliced a cheek off