At 1:00 PM -0500 1/5/01, Ken Brown wrote:
Harmon Seaver wrote:
In different areas of the US we have different tems for the thing get water out of at the sink. In the south it's often called spigot, and in the north faucet. Also tap. What do you Brits call that?
Tap. We find the word "faucet" funny, it sounds as if it should be slightly obscene, a good example of the US habit of never using a short word when a long one will do. But when I found myself amongst Americans I was slightly disappointed to find that they almost all say "tap" these days. Just as they say "car" instead of "automobile". You are obviously all watching too much British TV, or listening to too many British rock bands. You should defend your language against this tide of old-world vulgarity.
I'm now 49, and "car" has been much more common in these United States than "automobile" has been, in my lifetime. Further, I often hear Britishisms which are far longer and more labored than the American equivalents. For example: "articulated lorry" vs. "semi" "redundant" vs. "laid-off" "Mackintosh" vs. "raincoat" "Pantechnicon" = "moving van" (I only learned this last one on a site devoted to Britishisms vs. Americanisms.) Fact is, both dialects of English have longer versions of the same basic word than other dialects have. Which is preferable is a matter of taste and familiarity. --Tim May -- Timothy C. May tcmay@got.net Corralitos, California Political: Co-founder Cypherpunks/crypto anarchy/Cyphernomicon Technical: physics/soft errors/Smalltalk/Squeak/agents/games/Go Personal: b.1951/UCSB/Intel '74-'86/retired/investor/motorcycles/guns