I don’t understand this universe any more

[Wez]

11 hours ago, Pete F said:

 

....on the Isle of Wight, where I lived as a teenager...   ...I suspect in those days cultural changes like this moved around much more slowly. Perhaps we were a bit behind on the Island 🙂

 

 

As we've previously discussed, shared cultural heritage there being a fellow Vectisian, I began to encounter gay in its current meaning when I began travelling to the north island for a gig, that would be the very late 70's.

[Bullbasket]

I blame Larry Grayson.

 

John.

[593jones]

21 hours ago, Pete in Lincs said:

Me too. Read memoirs or watch TV & films from before 1960, even the Flintstones title music (1960). It was used in the context of happy.

Other, not so nice, hurtful, words were used in the other context.

I think it's time we changed the subject. this is heading towards upsetting Mike, or worse, Heather.

 

 

This universe? this Country. Watch something like Police Interceptors.

They risk their lives to arrest criminals, and time and again at the end of the show you hear -" No charges were brought". 

My Sister and her Husband have both taken early retirement from the force.

They were sick of seeing the same criminals being let off again and again.

 

 

It does make you wonder what you have to do to end up in court.  Yesterday SWMBO was watching a programme about catching shoplifters.  A foreign gentleman was caught having left a shop wearing a pair of trainers he had not paid for.  Eventually he admitted the theft and when asked for details gave ;his name and said he was homeless.  The upshot was, he had his photograph taken, was warned not to enter that particular shop again and sent on his way, still wearing his new, unpaid for, trainers.  Result for the shoplifter, I would think.

[alt-92]

Still cheaper than HMP&PS on tax payers' dime. 

[MajorCalloway]

4 hours ago, 593jones said:

 

It does make you wonder what you have to do to end up in court.  Yesterday SWMBO was watching a programme about catching shoplifters.  A foreign gentleman was caught having left a shop wearing a pair of trainers he had not paid for.  Eventually he admitted the theft and when asked for details gave ;his name and said he was homeless.  The upshot was, he had his photograph taken, was warned not to enter that particular shop again and sent on his way, still wearing his new, unpaid for, trainers.  Result for the shoplifter, I would think.

Would it have made any difference if he wasn’t a ‘foreign gentlemen’? And what do you mean? An American tourist perhaps?

[Black Knight]

re; briefly etc

In Ulster we have just three sayings when asked or told do something

1. Right = I'll do it after I finish this cup of tea and/or ciggie

2. Right, I'm on it =  I'll do it after I finish this cup of tea and/or ciggie and maybe today or tomorrow

3. Right, I'll see to that = I'll get round to doing that sometime before next Christmas, if you're lucky

[593jones]

17 hours ago, MajorCalloway said:

Would it have made any difference if he wasn’t a ‘foreign gentlemen’? And what do you mean? An American tourist perhaps?

 

No difference, just giving the facts, and I believe ;he claimed to be Dutch;.

[alt-92]

I admit!

 

 

[jackroadkill]

17 hours ago, Black Knight said:

re; briefly etc

In Ulster we have just three sayings when asked or told do something

1. Right = I'll do it after I finish this cup of tea and/or ciggie

2. Right, I'm on it =  I'll do it after I finish this cup of tea and/or ciggie and maybe today or tomorrow

3. Right, I'll see to that = I'll get round to doing that sometime before next Christmas, if you're lucky

 

That's very similar to a phrase we use here: now in a minute.  To say "I'll do it now" means that as soon as is expedient I will attend to and resolve the problem, or do the job.  To say "I'll do it now in a minute" means that if you're lucky I might give it some sort of attention at some time before the sun dies.

[Black Knight]

On 07/01/2022 at 16:39, 593jones said:

 

It does make you wonder what you have to do to end up in court.  . . . .

Here, in Nee, Just last December a man aged about 60 was up in court for assaulting two police officers

The history of the case;

The man did some shop-lifting and left the shop. Apparently no-one had noticed so he went back into the shop put back what he stole then stole some more expensive items. This was noticed and he was stopped just out side the shop. Items taken off him and he was told not to come back and clear off. So the man shoved the security man, he did this until it was decided to call the police. The police came, apprehended the man. They gave him a 'talking to' and a verbal warning. Then the man started to punch one of the police officers (they wear bullet proof vests so there was no harm done). The police arrested the man. He appeared in court the next day. Explanation given for this behaviour - the man was homeless and penniless and didn't want to spend the winter (yet another one) on the streets. And what did the magistrate give him? A caution, a warning and a fine of about £100!

 

Sub-note; I believe a charity for the homeless got their hands on the man and got him into shelter somewhere

[Seahawk]

On 1/8/2022 at 3:36 AM, Black Knight said:

re; briefly etc

In Ulster we have just three sayings when asked or told do something

1. Right = I'll do it after I finish this cup of tea and/or ciggie

2. Right, I'm on it =  I'll do it after I finish this cup of tea and/or ciggie and maybe today or tomorrow

3. Right, I'll see to that = I'll get round to doing that sometime before next Christmas, if you're lucky

In Cornwall we have "dreckly".  It literally means "directly" ie straightaway.  In practice it has been defined as "like manana but without the sense of urgency".  As in many languages the meaning can be radically affected by intonation:

 

• Positive as in "I'll be over dreckly".  Which means "You can expect me to turn up in some elastic period between a few minutes and a few hours" (ie a degree of positive intent, at least at the time of speaking, to do something).
• Defensive/firm: "I'll do it dreckly".   Meaning "I will do it when I am good and ready and, the more you nag me, the less likely that will be any time soon."

[Space Ranger]

On 1/2/2022 at 4:48 AM, Wez said:

 

If you're using a Windows based PC go to Windows Tools and select Character Map which gives a whole spectrum of different characters.  I've pinned it to my taskbar as I find it very useful when typing a French word when I'm not using Word or a similar application.

Macs have a similar feature. On mine, an American flag appears in the header at the top of the Finder. If i click on it, I have these options: Show Character Palette, Show Keyboard Viewer (shows what character is mapped to each of the keys, including Shift, Control, Option, and Apple key), Show Input Source Name (national abbreviation in addition to flag, i.e., 'U.S.' in addition to American flag), and Open International, which opens System preferences and allows you to change the language preferences for everything.

[Space Ranger]

On 12/15/2021 at 6:05 PM, Learstang said:

 

Well I live in Texas, and speak some Spanish, and yes, in a colloquial sense, manana (I don't know how to put the tilde over the first 'n'!) can mean something like 'later'.

 

Regards,

 

Jason

If you have a Mac, hold down the Option key and type 'n'. Then release the Option key and type 'n' again. The n will then appear with the tilde: ñ. There are similar commands for other diacritical marks. For example, hold down the Option key, type a 'u', then type an 'o'. Result: ö.

 

Of course here in Texas, we have our own version of the English language. For example, the plural of "you" is "you all," usually pronounced "y'all" (rhymes with"yawl"). And the plural of "y'all" is, of course, "all y'all."

 

My favorite Texasism is "fixing to," pronounced "fixin' to," meaning "getting ready to [do something], as in "Ah'm fixin' to go to the store." Which, of course, leads to constructions such as "Ah'm fixin' to get ready to go to the store."

 

I am 75 and a native Texan, and I never fail to be amused by how some of my fellow Texans mangle the "Kang's Anglish." I frequently hear "dreckly" used as in Seahawk's examples, and from people who couldn't find Cornwall on a map!

 

I lived and worked in Connecticut for seven years, and folks were always kidding me about my Texas accent. My response usually was, "Ah don't have an accent; it's all y'all that have an accent!'

Edited January 13, 2022 by Space Ranger

[Learstang]

Yes, I consider myself to be a fairly erudite and educated Texan (seven years of post-high school (secondary school) education), but I still use 'y'all' and 'fixin' to' quite regularly. And just as any good Scotsman can really put on the 'Scots' when he wants to, I can talk Texan with the best of them, when I want to.

 

Regards,

 

Jason

Edited January 13, 2022 by Learstang
Additional comments added.

[Pete in Lincs]

Well you good 'ol boys be sure to let us know when you intend to mosey on down to check out the varmints.

BTW, Apparently varmint is a pre Victorian English word. Who knew? Bill Bryson, that's who.

[Pete in Lincs]

Here's another one. Have you tried to buy a light bulb recently? They seem to be scarce in the shops for a start. And, Lumens?

 

Apparently the definition of a Lumen is..

The SI unit of luminous flux, equal to the amount of light emitted per second in a unit solid angle of one steradian from a uniform source of one candela.

There, you see. Clear as mud.

What was wrong with watts? Everyone knows how bright a 60W bulb is. I had to find an on line conversion chart! It's around 750 Lumens.

Nope, it still doesn't compute.

I know a Bar is just over 14 PSI. I never could figure out Newton Metres for torque purposes. And now they throw this at us!

Is this an EEC after effect? I'm (ahem) in the dark.

[Vince1159]

The more i read this thread the  more i'm confused about this bleedin' planet let alone the universe....

[Jochen Barett]

23 minutes ago, Pete in Lincs said:

+++

What was wrong with watts? Everyone knows how bright a 60W bulb is. I had to find an on line conversion chart! It's around 750 Lumens.

Nope, it still doesn't compute.

I know a Bar is just over 14 PSI. I never could figure out Newton Metres for torque purposes. And now they throw this at us!

Is this an EEC after effect? I'm (ahem) in the dark.

They don't make em like this anymore!

 

In the olden days you had clear and frosted bulbs and power consumption was closely related to light output, end of story. A little later they invented halogen bulbs, sodium lamps, fluorescent tubes and now LEDs.

So the "imperial" way would have resulted in some new form of "untechnical" chaos, like 12 gauge LED lamps (as bright as 12 regular bulbs or as long as a dozen bulbs) or maybe "3/16th new Watts per foot candle to 1 old Watt" bulbs.

 

I acknowledge habit is stronger than gravity though. A lot of things in engineering become too easy when using the metric system.

[Seahawk]

16 hours ago, Space Ranger said:

I lived and worked in Connecticut for seven years, and folks were always kidding me about my Texas accent. My response usually was, "Ah don't have an accent; it's all y'all that have an accent!'

I was touring in West Virginia once with a girl from Connecticut.  We were in a diner one evening and noticed the staff whispering behind their hands.  My friend said, "You think they're laughing at your accent?  No, they're laughing at mine."  PS Main thing I remember about West Virginia is that it's shut after 8pm.

[Learstang]

1 hour ago, Pete in Lincs said:

Well you good 'ol boys be sure to let us know when you intend to mosey on down to check out the varmints.

 

I hear that! Dang, you pert near talk proper like. I tell you what, that's a fact.

 

Best Regards,

 

Jason

[Learstang]

12 minutes ago, Seahawk said:

PS Main thing I remember about West Virginia is that it's shut after 8pm.

 

Parts of Texas used to be that way (some still are, no doubt). A joke from a long time ago was that in Waco, especially on a Sunday night, they rolled up the streets [like a carpet] at 8 P.M.

 

Regards,

 

Jason

[bootneck]

A few years ago, my wife and I went touring the USA east-west coast to coast.  It was a great trip and we enjoyed Thanksgiving (November) in one of the mid-states; however, the next day when we moved on, there was nothing to see or do; everything seemed closed.  We asked what had suddenly happened and were told "after Thanksgiving we pull in the sidewalks".   Evidently this was a referall to closing down for the winter.

 

Mike

[Moggy]

Hmm..

 

Things were different 30+ years ago...

 

In Trieste (Italy) 1982 if you died on the streets on a Saturday after 13.00 they picked you up on Monday morning 

 

Same thing in Gothenburg ca. 1985.

Gothenburg is Sweden's second city in size.

 

Coming (as I did) from one of the bigger cities in the world it was kind of a shock.

 

Cheers, Moggy

 

Edited January 13, 2022 by Moggy
duplicated text - weird

[Pete in Lincs]

54 minutes ago, Jochen Barett said:

 

I acknowledge habit is stronger than gravity though. A lot of things in engineering become too easy when using the metric system.

An easy to read chart in the shop, or a simple 750 = 60W on the package would help though.

And yet, I can still buy 40W Halogen bulbs for the cooker hood! 😕

[Jo NZ]

5 hours ago, Pete in Lincs said:

I know a Bar is just over 14 PSI. I never could figure out Newton Metres for torque purposes. And now they throw this at us!

Is this an EEC after effect? I'm (ahem) in the dark.

You're well out of date. Bars are out, 1 atm. is now 100kiloPascals!