Given a choice between different styles of words approximating the same things, which do you prefer?
Or do you mix it up from time to time?
1. Trash can, ash can, refuse. Have you ever refused to take out the refuse? Have you ever heard this? "Don't forget to take out the garbage!" But above all, I love the term "ash can" -- it evokes a long history. How about you? I also love the word debris, and knew an English woman who pronounced it debbriss (as her fellow "countrymen" do, too).
2. Bag, sack, burplap, Hessian. Would you like paper, plastic, or jute?
3. Pocket book, purse, carrier bag, knapsack, haversack, briefcase?
4. Casket, coffin; graveyard, cemetery?
5. Food combos: pigs in a blanket, worms in the grave, eggs in a nest?
6. If you go down to the 7-Eleven, Wawa or equivalent, is it a convenience store, short stop, or something else? Is there a five and dime and a mom-and-pop in your neck of the woods?
7. Gas station, service station, filling station, petrol bunk, garage or something else?
8. Grocery store, grocery, supermarket, the grocer's, down to market?
9. Up North, Down to Shore, Out West, Out East, Back East, Down South, over yonder, way down yonder, coastal, over there, across the sea, in country?
Today's Rune: Separation (Reversed).
6 comments:
Today, my nursing instructor referred to a water fountain as a "bubbler," which means she's probably from Wisconsin. Regional dialects are funny things.
When I'd go to visit relatives in Louisiana, I had to remember that they didn't have lunch; that was dinner. Supper was the last meal of the day. For we yankees, the words were interchangeable as the last meal of the day.
fun post :)
Bubbler is a good one. Old "what's his face" used to say that from Kenosha. Dinner/supper=old fashioned distinctions, certainly.
Nunya, thanks~ I just remembered for #1 "dustbin" in London. Sounds so dainty. #5 toads-in-a-hole: remembered that one, too.
#5: more-- One Eye, Cyclops, Bird-in-a-Nest, Egyptian Eggs. Why? I know not for the last one . . .
I've heard of pigs in a blanket but not the others. I like the word casket for some reason, and cemetery. I like "c" sounding words.
I once accidentally pulled into a full service gas station & asked for "high test." My passengers ridiculed me all the way to our destination.
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