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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: The Pond Gap
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Sioni Sais
Shipmate
# 5713
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Ariel:
Wot, no hot apple pie or hot chocolate fudge brownies with a dollop of lovely cold vanilla ice-cream melting into them?
(I wouldn't want it served that way every single time but do think it's nice for a treat.)
FWIW apple pie or apple crumble with ice cream and custard is wonderful. Nothing exceeds like excess.
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"He isn't Doctor Who, he's The Doctor"
(Paul Sinha, BBC)
Posts: 24276 | From: Newport, Wales | Registered: Apr 2004
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ArachnidinElmet
Shipmate
# 17346
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Posted
Many thanks for the replies about mentalism upthread. I'd only come across the word relatively recently (unlike 'being mental' which I remember being very popular when I was a kid,), so probably haven't met many mentalists of either stripe. Maybe.
'A la mode' always makes me think of a teenage Bobby Drake aka X-men's Iceman using his ice-powers to freeze some pie at the dinner table at Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters. Who says comics aren't educational.
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'If a pleasant, straight-forward life is not possible then one must try to wriggle through by subtle manoeuvres' - Kafka
Posts: 1887 | From: the rhubarb triangle | Registered: Sep 2012
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Uncle Pete
Loyaute me lie
# 10422
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Posted
Pie a la mode just means pie served in the style or custom of the day. In the US, this was ice cream; when I grew up, a la mode was more likely to refer to cheese.
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Even more so than I was before
Posts: 20466 | From: No longer where I was | Registered: Sep 2005
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Amanda B. Reckondwythe
Dressed for Church
# 5521
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Angel Wrestler:
It still sounds funny to start a sentence with the word "so." The word "so" is a conjunction. It describes something that happened as a result of something else.
So how's about "so" as the only word in the sentence?
My first job, fresh out of high school, was as houseman in a hotel. The head housekeeper, a German woman, showed me how to do the various chores that comprised my duties. Each time I finished a task according to her directions, she would say, "So." I assumed she meant "Thus", or "Yes, that's the way to do it."
And what about Pharoah's -- oops, I mean Yul Brynner's -- line "So let it be written, so let it be done" in The Ten Commandments?
[ 17. August 2013, 19:24: Message edited by: Amanda B. Reckondwythe ]
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"I take prayer too seriously to use it as an excuse for avoiding work and responsibility." -- The Revd Martin Luther King Jr.
Posts: 10542 | From: The Great Southwest | Registered: Feb 2004
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Sioni Sais
Shipmate
# 5713
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gee D:
I'm far from clear how a republic can have realtors.....
If they use Imperial measurements, I'm sure they can have realtors.
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"He isn't Doctor Who, he's The Doctor"
(Paul Sinha, BBC)
Posts: 24276 | From: Newport, Wales | Registered: Apr 2004
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jedijudy
Organist of the Jedi Temple
# 333
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Ariel:
Wot, no hot apple pie or hot chocolate fudge brownies with a dollop of lovely cold vanilla ice-cream melting into them?
(I wouldn't want it served that way every single time but do think it's nice for a treat.)
I think the only time pie a la mode was an enjoyable treat (for the weird kid, mind you) was when the pie was home made rhubarb hot out of the oven with vanilla hand cranked ice cream. Yum, yum!
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Jasmine, little cat with a big heart.
Posts: 18017 | From: 'Twixt the 'Glades and the Gulf | Registered: Aug 2001
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RuthW
liberal "peace first" hankie squeezer
# 13
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Latchkey Kid:
visiting the Pacific North West (BC, WA,OR) this year I discovered that 'a la mode' means with ice cream. I have never come across that usage in the UK (or OZ), or even the East Coast. Do people know about the distribution of this usage?
It goes all the way down the west coast of the US into southern California (where I live) and at least as far inland as the Central Valley of California (where my parents are from).
Posts: 24453 | From: La La Land | Registered: Apr 2001
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Palimpsest
Shipmate
# 16772
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Posted
I grew up with pie a la mode meaning with ice cream in New York and Boston. Serving apple pie with a slice of cheddar was a pretty much an obsolete tradition.
While there's still apple, cherry, blueberry,pumpkin, lemon meringue, key lime, banana and chocolate cream pies, the number of pie varieties available seem to be shrinking on the Northeast and Northwest coasts. I can't remember the last time I saw a Bavarian Cream pie or a custard pie.
[ 18. August 2013, 00:13: Message edited by: Palimpsest ]
Posts: 2990 | From: Seattle WA. US | Registered: Nov 2011
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LutheranChik
Shipmate
# 9826
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Posted
Custard pies are alive and well in the Midwest. (Yay!)
I grew up with the idea that "a la mode" meant "topped with ice cream." Imagine my confusion when I started reading more sophisticated cookbooks and finding "a la mode" attached to recipes for, say, beef.
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Simul iustus et peccator
http://www.lutheranchiklworddiary.blogspot.com
Posts: 6462 | From: rural Michigan, USA | Registered: Jul 2005
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balaam
Making an ass of myself
# 4543
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Palimpsest:
Serving apple pie with a slice of cheddar was a pretty much an obsolete tradition.
And here. It has to be Wensleydale.
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Last ever sig ...
blog
Posts: 9049 | From: Hen Ogledd | Registered: May 2003
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jedijudy
Organist of the Jedi Temple
# 333
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Posted
[tangent] Nice to see you again, LutheranChik! ![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif) [/tangent]
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Jasmine, little cat with a big heart.
Posts: 18017 | From: 'Twixt the 'Glades and the Gulf | Registered: Aug 2001
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
While I was in the USA, staying with a mixed USA/Australia couple, I finally plucked up the courage to ask just what eggs 'over easy' meant.
I then had some.
And THEN I heard 'over medium' for the first time in my life.
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
Posts: 18173 | From: Under | Registered: Jul 2008
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Leorning Cniht
Shipmate
# 17564
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
And THEN I heard 'over medium' for the first time in my life.
And did you hear "over hard" (which is a cruel thing to do to a poor innocent egg)?
Posts: 5026 | From: USA | Registered: Feb 2013
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
Probably it has come up before. But I have no idea if "dinner" means lunch or supper. I hear it both ways and always have to ask. Dinner meaning only a special meal, like Christmas dinner.
The same holds for when someone says the time as "quarter of 4". Never can figure out if that's before or after. I think this last one might be an American usage. Not sure about the dinner one.
Posts: 11498 | From: Treaty 6 territory in the nonexistant Province of Buffalo, Canada ↄ⃝' | Registered: Mar 2010
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balaam
Making an ass of myself
# 4543
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Posted
Th time of "Dinner" varies with location and class. There is no set rule.
Generally speaking lower classes have dinner in the middle of the day and higher classed in the evening. Middle of the day dinner is also more common in the north of England.
Army regiments will even provide evening dinner to officers and mid-day dinner to other ranks.
With greater movement across classes as well as geographically, it all gets confusing.
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Last ever sig ...
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Posts: 9049 | From: Hen Ogledd | Registered: May 2003
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Uncle Pete
Loyaute me lie
# 10422
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Posted
A quarter of 4 is 4:15. A quarter to 4 is 3:45. I learnt this when I was a toddler.
Other languages have different ways of expressing this.
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Even more so than I was before
Posts: 20466 | From: No longer where I was | Registered: Sep 2005
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Firenze
Ordinary decent pagan
# 619
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Posted
There is breakfast - somewhere between 8 and 10: elevenses - at 11 of course: lunch at 1: tea at 4: dinner c 7.30: supper at around 10. Plus 'a little something' which may be taken at any time to sustain you in the arid wastes between actual meals.
Simple.
Posts: 17302 | From: Edinburgh | Registered: Jun 2001
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Edith
Shipmate
# 16978
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Posted
And if you're David Cameron you have 'country supper' which means hatching a plot with Rebekah Wade.
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Edith
Posts: 256 | From: UK | Registered: Mar 2012
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Cara
Shipmate
# 16966
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by PeteC:
A quarter of 4 is 4:15. A quarter to 4 is 3:45. I learnt this when I was a toddler.
Other languages have different ways of expressing this.
Sorry Pete, beg to differ, at least as far as where I lived in the US (NY and PA.) "Quarter of four" is 3:45. Means a quarter shy of four. "A quarter to four," used less often in US IME, while more usual in UK, means the same thing.
For 4:15, I heard "a quarter after four" a bit more often in US, I think, than its equivalent "quarter past," which again seems to me more common in UK.
One interesting Pond difference, which caused me recent bafflement in communication with a friend, is what's called "positive anymore." (Lots about it on the internet).
Leaving aside the question of whether any more is one or two words, which is a different Pond issue, "positive anymore" is when someone says,
eg, "Anymore, gas is so expensive." Meaning "these days".
Even more weirdly, "I shop at Walmart anymore." When I read or hear this latter usage, it seems that the person was trying to say they DON'T shop at Walmart any more, whereas before they did, and they just forgot to put in the "don't." But no, it's another example of the positive anymore. They shop at Walmart these days (implying that before, they didn't.)
Apparently a mid-western phenomenon, found also in California (dust bowl migration effect)--but originally from some parts of Ireland!
I could go on about pond gap stuff. In fact, I probably will!!
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Pondering.
Posts: 898 | Registered: Feb 2012
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Wet Kipper
Circus Runaway
# 1654
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Posted
something that we have fallen foul of before in Transatlantic meetings is the verb "to table".
when we say it, it means we are putting it on the table to talk about.
When our US colleagues say "we'll table that" they mean taking it away and not talking about it again.....
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- insert randomly chosen, potentially Deep and Meaningful™ song lyrics here -
Posts: 9841 | From: further up the Hill | Registered: Nov 2001
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Cara
Shipmate
# 16966
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Wet Kipper:
something that we have fallen foul of before in Transatlantic meetings is the verb "to table".
when we say it, it means we are putting it on the table to talk about.
When our US colleagues say "we'll table that" they mean taking it away and not talking about it again.....
yes, this is full of potential for misunderstanding!
Another one is "bomb." As when something (project, Broadway show, idea, etc) goes brilliantly well; OR when it is a complete flop.
At this moment, I can't recall which is US and which UK!!!
[ 19. August 2013, 15:42: Message edited by: Cara ]
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Pondering.
Posts: 898 | Registered: Feb 2012
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Carex
Shipmate
# 9643
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Cara:
..."Quarter of four" is 3:45. Means a quarter shy of four. "A quarter to four," used less often in US IME, while more usual in UK, means the same thing.
For 4:15, I heard "a quarter after four" a bit more often in US, I think, than its equivalent "quarter past," which again seems to me more common in UK.
Growing up on the west coast of the US (at a time when about 3 in 4 of the kids in my school were immigrants from another state) it was always "quarter to / 'til" or "quarter after / past". If anyone used the phrase "quarter of" I would have interpreted it as "quarter before".
As far as I can tell, the reason such references are dropping out of favor is due to the introduction of clocks with digital displays: now if you asked the time it would be 3:47.
Posts: 1425 | Registered: Jun 2005
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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
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Posted
US: the show was a bomb = bad, the show was the bomb = good.
Like, crystal clear, dude.
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I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008
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Amanda B. Reckondwythe
Dressed for Church
# 5521
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Cara:
"I shop at Walmart anymore." <<snip>> It's another example of the positive anymore. They shop at Walmart these days (implying that before, they didn't.)
I've heard the expression, but I think it's extremely rare.
As for the expressions of time, "quarter to four" or "quarter till four" means 3:45; "quarter past four" or "quarter after four" means 4:15. "Quarter of four" I've never heard.
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"I take prayer too seriously to use it as an excuse for avoiding work and responsibility." -- The Revd Martin Luther King Jr.
Posts: 10542 | From: The Great Southwest | Registered: Feb 2004
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Angloid
Shipmate
# 159
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by balaam:
quote:
Originally posted by Palimpsest:
Serving apple pie with a slice of cheddar was a pretty much an obsolete tradition.
And here. It has to be Wensleydale.
My mum always used to say, 'an apple pie without the cheese is like a kiss without the squeeze.' (Funny really because she wasn't the kissy-cuddly sort)
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Brian: You're all individuals!
Crowd: We're all individuals!
Lone voice: I'm not!
Posts: 12927 | From: The Pool of Life | Registered: May 2001
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Wet Kipper:
something that we have fallen foul of before in Transatlantic meetings is the verb "to table".
when we say it, it means we are putting it on the table to talk about.
When our US colleagues say "we'll table that" they mean taking it away and not talking about it again.....
It actually means (in US) to set it aside for now with the understanding it will be talked about at a later date, often specified in the motion itself ("I vote we table that motion until we have a quorum...")
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
Thinking of food terminology. A sideways reading of "to table".
Does anyone anywhere else eat "dainties". These are usually little pieces of sweet squares, like O Henry Slice or Nanaimo Bars. They are generally called dainties here.
The other one that also confused a visitor, is that they had never had nor heard of a jellied salad, which is jello with things in it like vegetables or fruit.
Does anyone make bannock? Made some on Saturday for breakfast and it got me thinking if this is common anywhere else these days. The history is Scottish and First Nations as far as I know.
[ 19. August 2013, 16:52: Message edited by: no prophet ]
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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
\_(ツ)_/
Posts: 11498 | From: Treaty 6 territory in the nonexistant Province of Buffalo, Canada ↄ⃝' | Registered: Mar 2010
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Angloid
Shipmate
# 159
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by balaam:
Generally speaking lower classes have dinner in the middle of the day and higher classed in the evening. Middle of the day dinner is also more common in the north of England.
I'm sure we've had this discussion before. It's more complicated than that. Strictly, 'dinner' is the main meal of the day at whatever time it is taken. The upper and middle classes - being lazy s***s - had only just finished breakfast by midday so dinner became later and later, finally ending up about 7 or so in the evening. The workers, who were up and about early, needed to eat at midday.
However, shifting work patterns and lifestyles mean that for most people today the midday (approx) meal is either a snack at one's workplace or a fairly light meal at best - lunch.
Most people now I think have their main meal in the evening. But the middle class, self-conscious about calling it dinner (unless it's a dinner party or full-dress occasion), tend to call that 'supper' (which for working class people is a couple of cream crackers before going to bed). The latter persist in calling their midday snack 'dinner' and their evening meal 'tea', even if they don't drink any tea with it and if it is from the same Delia Smith or Jamie Oliver cookbook that the middle classes use.
As an example of the confused class self-image we have in our house, 'lunch' is a snacky thing in the early afternoon (being retired we, like the aristocracy, have only just finished breakfast at 12) but we persist in calling the evening meal 'tea'. Sometimes we will have 'supper' before bed which might consist of a slice of toast and glass of whisky!
I get the impression that Americans tend to eat early: dinner at 5 or 6pm. Is that accurate? Certainly if you go out to a restaurant in the UK - unless its the child-friendly sort with lots of families - it will be deserted until about 8 or even 9.
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Brian: You're all individuals!
Crowd: We're all individuals!
Lone voice: I'm not!
Posts: 12927 | From: The Pool of Life | Registered: May 2001
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Uncle Pete
Loyaute me lie
# 10422
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Posted
More likely fur-trade meets Indian = Métis.
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Even more so than I was before
Posts: 20466 | From: No longer where I was | Registered: Sep 2005
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Cara
Shipmate
# 16966
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Posted
At Amanda B. Reckonedwythe: The positive anymore is apparently not that rare in certain areas of the US, and spreading, according to what I've been reading on the internet.
Angloid, re dinner (which we have indeed discussed before): for me, very definitely the evening meal, but the evening meal eaten by adults. When I was growing up, the children under about 15 had an early meal at about 5:30 so they could then be got ready for bed at a decent hour. This early meal was supper. The adults had dinner at about 8. No self-consciousness about calling it dinner, as mentioned by Angloid.
Yes, Americans--or some of them anyway-- IME tend to have dinner earlier than the British, and much earlier than continental Europeans.
We grew up in the south but my sister has gone Oop North and now speaks of the evening meal as "tea" which I simply can't get used to--as I think I've related before, when once online she mused aloud about what on earth she was going to make for tea, I in all sincerity replied,
"...um, a cup or even a pot of tea? And maybe a biscuit?"
[ 19. August 2013, 17:11: Message edited by: Cara ]
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Pondering.
Posts: 898 | Registered: Feb 2012
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Ariel
Shipmate
# 58
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Angloid:
I'm sure we've had this discussion before.
Many times. Many, many times.
I ran into trouble at college with the tea/dinner thing when another student invited me round for tea. We had several cups of the stuff and I was getting hungrier and hungrier but no sign of any food, until she said, "Right, my landlady says my dinner's nearly ready so out you go". And back to college I went starving, to find I had missed dinner. In Dublin "dinner" was what we had at lunchtime and "tea" in the evening. I knew what they meant at college but it can be difficult to gauge the nuances of an informal invitation.
Also, the time thing used to confuse the foreign students hugely. "When you say to turn up at half seven do you mean 18:30 or 19:30? And should we be late to be polite or is it rude if we don't turn up on time?"
Posts: 25445 | Registered: May 2001
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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
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Posted
Perhaps this thread should be called the Region Gap as we cannot agree within the same countries, much less land mass.
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I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008
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comet
Snowball in Hell
# 10353
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Wet Kipper:
something that we have fallen foul of before in Transatlantic meetings is the verb "to table".
when we say it, it means we are putting it on the table to talk about.
When our US colleagues say "we'll table that" they mean taking it away and not talking about it again.....
in my (US) experience, if you "table" a motion, you are taking it away, but it HAS to be addressed at the next meeting, even if only to table it again. tabling it a temporary postponement, often while awaiting more information.
As someone who has been on a number of boards (!) and has been the secretary more than once, if a board votes to table something, I immediately add it to the next agenda unless the table motion includes a different specific date.
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Evil Dragon Lady, Breaker of Men's Constitutions
"It's hard to be religious when certain people are never incinerated by bolts of lightning.” -Calvin
Posts: 17024 | From: halfway between Seduction and Peril | Registered: Sep 2005
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Palimpsest
Shipmate
# 16772
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
US: the show was a bomb = bad, the show was the bomb = good.
Like, crystal clear, dude.
Except there's a US youth usage "It's the bomb" meaning great. This caused a local guerrilla artist some problems when he attached a ball and chain to the Hammering Man sculpture and one of the youth who helped make the ball and chain it had chalked "It's the Bomb" on it which the police took literally.
Posts: 2990 | From: Seattle WA. US | Registered: Nov 2011
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Wet Kipper
Circus Runaway
# 1654
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Posted
thanks for the explanation of the US "table" usually we don't discuss it again because things they table usually get an offline decision from the Boss (without our say) by the time the next meeting comes around
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- insert randomly chosen, potentially Deep and Meaningful™ song lyrics here -
Posts: 9841 | From: further up the Hill | Registered: Nov 2001
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basso
Ship’s Crypt Keeper
# 4228
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Posted
I grew up in California, and my parents are from the Midwest. "A quarter of" the hour is something that I grew up with, but younger people seem not to understand it at all. I've chalked that up (is that another idiom that's becoming obsolete?) to digital clocks, but I wonder now if it's another US regional difference.
We've also had the 'eggs over medium' discussion here. US shipmates mostly agree with me that it's way too difficult to get your eggs delivered properly over medium; UK folks seem to think it's a foolish thing to expect to get in the first place.
Posts: 4358 | From: Bay Area, Calif | Registered: Mar 2003
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Amanda B. Reckondwythe
Dressed for Church
# 5521
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Cara:
The positive anymore is apparently not that rare in certain areas of the US, and spreading, according to what I've been reading on the internet.
Which everyone knows is gospel truth.
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"I take prayer too seriously to use it as an excuse for avoiding work and responsibility." -- The Revd Martin Luther King Jr.
Posts: 10542 | From: The Great Southwest | Registered: Feb 2004
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Leorning Cniht
Shipmate
# 17564
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by no prophet:
Does anyone anywhere else eat "dainties". These are usually little pieces of sweet squares, like O Henry Slice or Nanaimo Bars. They are generally called dainties here.
Like petit fours?
quote:
The other one that also confused a visitor, is that they had never had nor heard of a jellied salad, which is jello with things in it like vegetables or fruit.
I certainly ate jelly with fruit (from a tin, natch) in it as a UK child, but I don't remember that we had a special name for it - it was just "oranges and jelly" or whatever, I think.
quote:
Originally posted by Cara:
Yes, Americans--or some of them anyway-- IME tend to have dinner earlier than the British, and much earlier than continental Europeans.
"Standard" dinner time varies a bit by region in the US, too, but about the hardest thing to get used to when moving from the UK to the US midwest was that we could go out, have a couple of pints, and by the time we headed off in search of dinner at 9-9:30, find that all the restaurants were putting chairs on tables.
Posts: 5026 | From: USA | Registered: Feb 2013
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Latchkey Kid
Shipmate
# 12444
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Posted
I suppose I could have worked it out from TV/films, but this was the first year I understood what bussing was and what busboys did.
Then I wondered why tipping did not cover the bussing, or if you tipped even if you collected your own food from the counter. There is so much more to learn about tipping than the travel guides tell you.
And remembering Comet saying that Aussies are the worst tippers I tried to make sure all my tips were at least 20% and that they knew we were Australian. But I never did work out what was appropriate for the people who made up the motel rooms, or for tour operators.
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'You must never give way for an answer. An answer is always the stretch of road that's behind you. Only a question can point the way forward.'
Mika; in Hello? Is Anybody There?, Jostein Gaardner
Posts: 2592 | From: The wizardest little town in Oz | Registered: Mar 2007
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Leorning Cniht:
quote:
Originally posted by no prophet:
Does anyone anywhere else eat "dainties". These are usually little pieces of sweet squares, like O Henry Slice or Nanaimo Bars. They are generally called dainties here.
Like petit fours?
No, or at least 'no' to the wikipedia pictures of them. Never heard of petit-fours. Those are like pieces of cake and full desserts. Dainties are usually such that you eat 3 or 5 of them. They are typically much smaller. Here's a few common ones: peanut butter marshmallow squares, Nanaimo bars, matrimonial cake.
They are typically about 1½"×1½" and maybe ½" to ¾" high. The are differentiated from things like rice krispie squares and puffed wheat cake, but I can't exactly say the differences except dainties are rich and sweet.
As for the Métis, I'm sure that's a bannock eating group/nation too, but we don't seem to connect it so much to them as to Cree people who got the ideas from Scottish and Orkneymen who staffed the Hudson Bay Co. stores, at least in the west. It's pretty common for it to be the bread item at a potluck supper in the north.
[ 20. August 2013, 02:43: Message edited by: no prophet ]
Posts: 11498 | From: Treaty 6 territory in the nonexistant Province of Buffalo, Canada ↄ⃝' | Registered: Mar 2010
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LutheranChik
Shipmate
# 9826
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Posted
Yes, Americans tend to have early dinner -- more so I think in the Midwest and in rural areas in general. When my dad was farming, he up at 4:00 if not earlier and busy in the barn milking cows during the wee hours; so breakfast at our house was quite early, and this also tended to move up the other two meals of the day -- that and the necessity of going out to the barn again by early evening to milk the cows again. Long after we sold our dairy herd and my father started "working out," we still tended to keep the same hours for meals. Before my dad went to work outside the farm our midday meal was indeed "dinner," the large meal of the day, but with him gone during the day it quickly changed to a fast lunch for my mom, and for me if I was home, with the large meal after my dad got home. (Still quite early.)
Interestingly, DP and I find ourselves eating at farmers' hours, even when we go out to eat; we joke about getting home before the street lights come on, but actually we are a little cautious about driving distances (necessary to go to nice restaurants)late at night with so many deer in our part of the world -- it's a legitimate concern, and since we've both had car-deer accidents in the past we're cautious. Our bi-coastal kids, who work odd hours, dine at truly Continental hours, which really messes up our biorhythms and tummies alike when we visit.
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Simul iustus et peccator
http://www.lutheranchiklworddiary.blogspot.com
Posts: 6462 | From: rural Michigan, USA | Registered: Jul 2005
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Leorning Cniht
Shipmate
# 17564
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by no prophet:
No, or at least 'no' to the wikipedia pictures of them. Never heard of petit-fours. Those are like pieces of cake and full desserts. Dainties are usually such that you eat 3 or 5 of them.
Petit fours are small - each one is about a mouthful. You might eat one or two with a post-prandial coffee, after having had dessert, or you might eat a selection as a light dessert, or with tea.
Posts: 5026 | From: USA | Registered: Feb 2013
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Ariel
Shipmate
# 58
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by no prophet:
Does anyone anywhere else eat "dainties". These are usually little pieces of sweet squares, like O Henry Slice or Nanaimo Bars. They are generally called dainties here.
... Dainties are usually such that you eat 3 or 5 of them. They are typically much smaller. Here's a few common ones: peanut butter marshmallow squares, Nanaimo bars, matrimonial cake.
They are typically about 1½"×1½" and maybe ½" to ¾" high. The are differentiated from things like rice krispie squares and puffed wheat cake, but I can't exactly say the differences except dainties are rich and sweet.
Traybakes. They are prevalent here, usually in the form of flapjacks, chocolate squares, millionaire's shortbread, brownies etc etc. Nothing very dainty about them as they are bigger than you specify. Smaller ones of that dimension would be "bites".
Posts: 25445 | Registered: May 2001
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comet
Snowball in Hell
# 10353
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Latchkey Kid:
I suppose I could have worked it out from TV/films, but this was the first year I understood what bussing was and what busboys did.
Then I wondered why tipping did not cover the bussing,
servers share their tips with bussers, door minders, dishwashers, and sometimes cooks. it all gets spread around. at least cooks, though, and often door staff, also make more per hour. Tips are MEANT to reward service; but a good server shares it with "support" staff.
quote:
Originally posted by Latchkey Kid:
And remembering Comet saying that Aussies are the worst tippers I tried to make sure all my tips were at least 20% and that they knew we were Australian. But I never did work out what was appropriate for the people who made up the motel rooms, or for tour operators.
1) right on! way to blow the stereotype!
2) don't feel bad, I can never figure those ones out, either. or taxis, bellhops, or hair dressers. it's a minefield.
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Evil Dragon Lady, Breaker of Men's Constitutions
"It's hard to be religious when certain people are never incinerated by bolts of lightning.” -Calvin
Posts: 17024 | From: halfway between Seduction and Peril | Registered: Sep 2005
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Albertus
Shipmate
# 13356
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Posted
This is a bit of a tangent, but it all just shows why tipping, as a system, stinks. Much better for the dignity of all concerned for the employer just to pay a decent wage, set prices accordingly, and have done with it.
Posts: 6498 | From: Y Sowth | Registered: Jan 2008
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Baptist Trainfan
Shipmate
# 15128
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Angloid:
Certainly if you go out to a restaurant in the UK - unless its the child-friendly sort with lots of families - it will be deserted until about 8 or even 9.
You clearly don't live here in Suffolk then: many folk eat early and eateries are at their busiest around 7 pm. Our local "chippie" open after school and is closed before 9 pm.
And that's in town, not the countryside.
Posts: 9750 | From: The other side of the Severn | Registered: Sep 2009
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Firenze
Ordinary decent pagan
# 619
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Posted
Or Edinburgh. Busiest would be 7 to 8.30 normally. Busy-ish until 10 - with perhaps a late pulse after the cinema/theatre/pub. A lot depends on location and clientele - but here, which I would describe as outer inner city, some places are packing up by 9.30. Half a mile away, and round the university, and particularly the Asian ones - probably still heaving until midnight.
Posts: 17302 | From: Edinburgh | Registered: Jun 2001
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Heavenly Anarchist
Shipmate
# 13313
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Angloid:
Most people now I think have their main meal in the evening. But the middle class, self-conscious about calling it dinner (unless it's a dinner party or full-dress occasion), tend to call that 'supper' (which for working class people is a couple of cream crackers before going to bed). The latter persist in calling their midday snack 'dinner' and their evening meal 'tea', even if they don't drink any tea with it and if it is from the same Delia Smith or Jamie Oliver cookbook that the middle classes use.
You have summarised my experience of meals as a child of working class Lancastrians living in the South, including the cream crackers and cheese before bed ![[Smile]](smile.gif) I still mostly use dinner and tea, to the exasperation of my soundly middle class husband and the amusement of my kids.
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'I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by.' Douglas Adams
Dog Activity Monitor
My shop
Posts: 2831 | From: Trumpington | Registered: Jan 2008
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Cara
Shipmate
# 16966
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Amanda B. Reckondwythe:
quote:
Originally posted by Cara:
The positive anymore is apparently not that rare in certain areas of the US, and spreading, according to what I've been reading on the internet.
Which everyone knows is gospel truth.
Ok well I now feel as if I must seem a bit dim--I do know the internet isn't the gospel truth, of course!
Just that lots of examples of the spread of this usage of "positive anymore" seem to imply it's not that rare, in certain parts of the US. Whereas in others it's unheard of.
But I freely admit, I'm not a linguist and don't really know.
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Pondering.
Posts: 898 | Registered: Feb 2012
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