Be Excellent To Each Other

I 'm leveraging this ariticle before i turn 35
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-14201796

Lots of those aren't even Americanisms but simply examples of poor grammar. Mostly, though, it seems to be moaning cunts just moaning about anyone who phrases things at all differently than they do.

Yeah, I thought that too. I used to be a lot more militant about Americanisms than I am now. Probably part of the fact is that I went there and had a thoroughly awesome time.

And you work for an American company..

Well, anything's a step up from a German one.

There's a certain charm to the way the yanks have held on to words that sound archaic to us. I love how at junctions the instruction is not 'give way' but 'yield'. Likewise, 'turnpike' and 'faucet' - wonderfully oldey worldey.

It did occur to me that if I pursue my dream of studying at a college in the US, I'll have to learn US spellings for things, which might take a while to get the hang of. Thankfully, I'm never quite sure on -ise or -ize, but I'd miss the 'u's in 'colour' etc.

Technically, of course, their spelling is more correct than ours.

That said, I do get seriously annoyed when websites use the American flag to illustrate "English" as a language option.

It's easy. Just remove 'u' from everything and use 'ize' for everything that would use 'ise'.

That's rather a sulforous comment. Really got my epipherine going.

I'd curl up in the fetal position in defense.

I've got a license to say whatever I want.

Remember: you shouldn't be needing stairs to get to the first floor. Unless you're in the basement, obviously.

Oooh, this I agree with. A lot of the words and phrases used are a lot more prosaic than our rather more utilitarian descriptions.

"Sidewalk" aside, obviously.

Woah woah woah. We say "first floor" to refer to the floor above ground level, don't we? Don't the yanks say "first floor" to refer to ground floor?

Yep. Our system makes so much more sense. The youth hostel in New York I stayed in used the European system, which confused me!

Crazy bastards! They need some standardization.

They could start by driving on the correct side of the road.

See, I think the US system for storeys makes more sense than ours.

Can't work out why I think that though.

At first I thought it was because I'm a programmer, and the first floor being on the ground is more logical. But then I remembered that programmers tend to deal with arrays and things starting at zero, so the ground floor makes sense in that context.

Whilst some Americanisms and 'business-speak' things are wanky, a lot of them are useful, and a lot of the people in that article are simply wrong, and need a big slap.

it just isn't sport anymore.

I don't even know what's wrong with this one. Plus, Mike is from Wales any way.

I like your guys' spunk.

"I'm good" is a fuck of a lot better than the UK's "alright?" "alright?" form of conversation on inner wellness.

"Dandy, sir, just dandy"

Tell me about it ... oh, you already did.

The day after I returned from holiday I drove back to Cornwall. I somehow managed to forget that I wasn't driving an automatic, and, still in fifth gear, stalled quite fantastically in a service station car park. I then made the same mistake at a roundabout a few hours later.

Feex.

I get much more annoyed these days with people moaning about language changes and business speak than I ever did about the words themselves.

Way to go!

Language naturally evolves (to google, to tweet and so on) with their users, and although I do dislike sloppy use of English, I don't believe that crossing the particular Rubicon to the French method of language protection is the answer. If you can make yourself understood at work, then that's all well and good, and workplace parlance is, nowadays, an accurate reflection of the international world we live in.

Tru dat.

Some places in the UK (well, Wales anyway) have adopted the US system. I can think of a shop and a educational centre which use it. I always think "no, this is the ground floor".

Canada's annoying, because it has loads of Americanisms but not a few otherwise common ones. You ask for the cheque and they say "You mean the bill, sir?". Gits.

Like, totally.

(I've only come across one traffic circle in the US, and that's in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. It was great fun watch them struggle with it)

There's one in Mason City, Iowa. Just before we were picked up (for an unrelated incident) by the police, my mate and I were in the bed of a pick up truck drinking beer as our friend drove around it several times. Good times. Except for the police bit. That was a bit embaressing.

Our American chums have some rather unusual Christian names like Buzz, Rock and Tag. Mind you, I expect some of ours sound odd.

Whatever.

Chuck Stetson is the best american name I've recently encountered.

Some doofus dropped a bunch of aluminum faucets on the sidewalk and blamed a soccer mom who cut the cheese out the station wagon window.

Chuck Stetson, Jr., would be cooler.

Spanky Spangler.

"Write me."

See, I think that's perfectly acceptable.

I've had at least two Americans raise the question of the current economic superfuntime ask me if Britain was contemplating leaving the Euro and returning to the pound.

In German, yes. Schreib mir!

In english, too.

Quite. You wouldn't bat an eyelid at 'phone me'.

I'm surprised they even know what the pound is. Most Americans I've spoken to haven't.