The language corner

Thanks a lot, @OnTheRoadAgain and @Katie for the thorough answers.

Deleted comment as was in reply to a comment in January; wouldn’t have made sense!

Why not? Language doesn’t expire like yogurt. :blush:

OK! A sandwich short of a picnic.

I have checked and it does exist. It’s registered in the Oxford Learner’s Dictionary

When a language is spoken in so many countries and regions it’s impossible to be familiar with all the words used by other speakers in other parts of the world.

Blind-
Definition number 4 in Merriam-Webster dictionary.

a

made or done without sight of certain objects or knowledge of certain facts that could serve for guidance or cause bias

a blind taste test

compare DOUBLE-BLIND, SINGLE-BLIND

b
having no knowledge of information that may cause bias during the course of an experiment or test

physicians blind to whether the test drug is administered

I must apologize in advance but I couldn’t resist this one. I enjoy language just as much as the most exciting game ever and I just chuckled at this

Is it a non native thing of can this message be translated as
“The path we have taken is not the one we wanted to take but, instead of turning back and finding a way out of the maze, we expect to get closer to our final destination by getting deeper into the woods”

Such a pity that you set out on this adventure with no road map or compass to guide you!

@Newpetlover As it is vaguely put, there is much space for ‘negative sentiment override’ as the relationship scientist John Gottman would say.

If some of the experiences were unpleasant: be factual and mention them. Example: I asked to take care of the plants, but when we came home, 3 of 10 plants were almost dead. (I would ask ChatGPT to make it sound less harsh :innocent::face_with_peeking_eye::wink:)

Vague terms are a huge indicator for a video call, and asking to be more specific unless you like risks :grin:

Thanks for your contribution. But I am afraid I don’t know what you mean by

This post was written over a year ago and was just a question about the posible nuances of a sentence if it was written in a review.

@Newpetlover my bad, sorry. I should have used an :wink: after the sentence to make my sentence a bit light hearted as it was supposed to mean. Scrolling through the topics just as a joyful break after a few days of working.

I had to google this one. Thanks, @Happypets for the learning opportunity

Knickers to her

In British and Irish informal slang, saying “knickers to someone” (often phrased as “Knickers to you!” or “Knickers to that!”) is a dismissive, mildly rude exclamation meaning “rubbish,” “nonsense,” “go to h-ll,” or “I don’t care/I refuse.”

I had to look it up too @Newpetlover !
It’s a great one @Happypets !.
I also got the meaning
I reject what you say
This one is going in my pocket for future use

I’ve just been idly scrolling through some listings and realised that ‘dinner’ means different things in different parts of the UK so could potentially cause confusion regarding feeding times. Where I come from dinner is at lunchtime - but could also be called lunch! The evening meal is called tea - unless you’re going out to a restaurant in which case it’s dinner! So I always chuckle when I read that kitty or fido has dinner at 6.00pm because it conjures up visions of them putting on smart clothes to go out!

Thanks for the contribution. Your comment reminded me of a frustrating experience regarding the meaning of supper. I was in Northern Ireland and I had always seen “supper” translated as “dinner”, so when I bought a ticket to an event that said “supper included”, I didn’t have dinner because I was expecting it would be provided. I started to feel quite hungry and asked my friend if we were having supper after the cup of tea, which I found strange, she said: “this is supper”. It was just a cup of tea with the tiniest biscuit I had ever seen!

Oh dear, that must have been disappointing!! I’d completely forgotten about supper, probably because my dad was the only one who could be said to have had it at home but to me it means a meal or a snack (definitely not just a cup of tea and a biscuit!) that would be eaten mid to late evening. You can have it at home or you can also go out to supper eg to someone else’s home but it’s definitely more casual than going out to dinner. That’s what it means to me anyway!

Yes, that’s a new interpretation on me as well, @Newpetlover ; I’d have been surprised also.

In the US (particularly in the south), supper is a meal eaten around 5/6pm. If we’d had a substantial hot dinner at midday (as often done on weekends in these modern, non-farming times), supper might just consist of warmed-up leftovers from dinner, with maybe some fresh cornbread or buttermilk biscuits (NOT cookies!) & a few extra “sides,” but it would generally be hot & filling — just not as formal as dinner.

At my great-grandmother’s when I was young, if there were a pack of us visiting, often the table & non-spoiling leftovers from dinner were just covered with a 2nd tablecloth after we ate. Then along about 4-5pm as people started becoming peckish again, we’d whisk the tablecloth away & mix up a batch biscuits/cornbread, heat up a pot of beans, maybe fry some potatoes & slice some tomatoes, and sit down and “tuck in!”

It’s interesting to know how many different meanings the same word can have.

I guess the meaning of supper may vary depending on where you come from.

I’m originally from the north of England and as a child we used to have supper. It was not the same as dinner/tea. It was a light snack in the mid to late evening. Definitely a little more than tea and a biscuit - that’s not a meal worthy of a name, that’s just a cuppa and a biscuit and can be had at any time of day! It might be crackers with cheese or something like that.

On the weekends we would have breakfast, dinner (main hot meal), tea and supper. Weekdays would be breakfast, lunch, dinner (main hot meal) and supper.

I am also from ‘Up North’ and it was always breakfast, dinner and tea when I was a child. It still is unless we have guests and then it is breakfast, lunch and dinner :joy: