Did you blokes know that Trainlady has re- emerged and we were all wrong about her, particularly me.
She is quite a nice person, names Sharon and has had some hard luck lately; a serious ilness in the family and she go hit by the hurricanes in Florida, so i’m sure we all send her our best wishes.
Somehting funny though; seems she is getting divorced and she said she would like to meet Brian. I was wondering how far south you go in your rig mate ?
Ian in Aussieland
Hey, everyone in life has their good side.
Bennie
Trainlady, I don’t recall her or the issues you mention? Could you bring me up to speed.
welcome back trainlady sorry about your problems glad you made it thru okay!
Ian,
Only in Canada Mate. It is me you are talking about right??? Florida is a loooooooong way from here. About 40 hours of driving. Rgds eh…Brian.
Brian I only made that up to brighten your day; regarding you lagomorph problem.
Everyone wants to be wanted, even if all you got out of it was a laugh, ok mate…
Joe you remeber when we had all that trouble with that Disneyland bloke and she came up shortly after and said she wanted to sell her entire collection.
I contacted her and started negotiations in a very positive way and she did not come back to me; so i concluded she was a mate of the Disneyland bloke and just sending us up, well I was dead wrong.
Regards Ian
I think Brian’s missus might have something to say about this…[;)][(-D]
In terms of orthography and semantics I must ask a question of Modern Britianic Language (including Aussie, Canadian and Kiwi tounges).
When is the term “bloke” appropiate? Is it ever a negative term. I should very much like to use it in its correct context.
Is a female “bloke” referred to as a “bird (sp)?” What’s it all about, Alfie?
Is the accent (inflection) that is stereotypically placed on Canadians in U.S. Television a mixture of the English Accent and Scandanavian dialets, or French?
What do you Modern Britanic think of the “American Accent?” Do you hear an accent in the standard American language? What do y’all think of the Southern accent or, for that matter, Ebonics?
This is just for my own socciology and curiosity? But to keep this in line with trains…
Woooooooooooo! Woooo![:D]
Add into that why are down under girls refered to as “Sheila’s” ? Where did that term come from?
Bloke is used the same way as guy is or fellers. “Hey, you blokes, let’s go have a beer!” Not derogatory.
Shiela is commonly used for young woman, derives from our large Irish heritage.
“We blokes went to the beach to check out the shielas.” English equivalent is birds, Us equivalent is broads (although I get the impression that ‘broads’ has a slightly seamy connotation)
Both terms unfortunately are slipping into disuse as our culture is being absorbed into US television overdose. However, there has been a recent groundswell here on the internet to re-introduce our own slang, hence this conversation! 
From the Online Etymological Dictionary:
"Sheila
fem. proper name, Ir. equivalent of Celia, shortened form of Cecilia (see Cecil). A standard type of an Ir. women’s name since 1828; slang for “girlfriend, young woman” dates from 1839. "
"bloke
“fellow,” 1851, London slang, of unknown origin, perhaps from Celt. ploc “large, stubborn person;” another suggestion is “Gypsy and Hind. loke a man.”
Thanks Phil,
Take it from an American observing the Ghetto-fication of our language, KEEP FIGHTING. I honestly cannot beleive it when I see some college kid or a guy guy in a business suit talking ghetto, I have to fight to keep from laughing. Its bad enough that the kids in our poorer neighborhoods cant speak English at a fourth grade level, then complain because they cant get beyond the most basic employment levels. “Yo yo yo, No-un will gib me a job cus da cant undastan me…” They dont learn this manner of speach at schools, they learn it from there peers, and from MTV videos who teach them that Eminem and Fifty Cent (Pronounced Fity cent) are roll models, I fear for America’s future…
Vic,
Are you sure you are from the LEFT COAST? I see a gram of conservatism in your statement, but then again even Michael Savage likes trains.
I would very much like to place some of the words on this forum in use in everyday langauge. I have been interjecting these words and phrases appearenly unawares.
I was told so by my wife…too much time in the forum, she says?!
I’m sure you will all find my accent to be strange, it is purely a television one, with elements of Tex-Mex, Texas and Southern accents made to sound ridiculous by a slight lisp (of which i have actively worked to remove). I hate the sound of my voice, but people seem to like my singing… http://carrales.tripod.com
Capt Carrales
Capt,
I have a nephew who lives in Houston, on the rare occasions we talk I understand about every 3rd word but he understands even less from me
On a personal point of bigotry here:
The appalling lack of correct spelling & grammar on this forum (& many others )is staggering. I couldn’t believe that someone actually spelt ‘dollar’ incorrectly! The 7 years I lived in the Mid-West I found the average Joe to be literate & reasonably well informed & I can only come to the conclusion that some people purposefully go out of their way to appear ignorant & illiterate when writing on forums (fora?)
Capt, you asked about American accents. The US is similar to the UK in that there are quite marked accent differences in short geographical distances (ie Maine to NJ, So Cal to Tx). I was able to tell from which state my fellow students came from in the way they pronounced different words, in fact in one case I won a bet by even telling a waitress in Iowa which new England town she hailed from (I cheated, my room mate was from the same town!)
However, here in Oz we have virtually no regional accents with the exception of a very few words. There is a distinct difference between rural accents & urban but the rural ones are consistent across the whole continent as are the city ones. The Kiwi accent is virtually identical to the Australian except for a slight shift in vowel pronounciation:
The rest of the English speaking world pronounce the vowels: Ay (as in hay) Ee (as in glee), eye, owe, you.
The Kiwis (especially South Island) shift the vowels one to the right so A becomes Ee, E becomes eye, I becomes u as in full, O is owe & u is ewe. A kiwi doesn’t pat the cat, he pets the ket. Jingle Bells becomes Jungle Bills.
The South African accent is similar to the NZ but is tinged with the glottal stops of the Germanic languages.
Fascinating study, accents.
Phil,
America is a nation of impatient and busy people. I didn’t have the time to start participating in forum discussions until after I’d retired. We often feel that we cannot afford to take the time to properly structure a sentance or check it for correct spelling and proper grammer. If we think that what we’ve just written will somehow get our message across,then close enough.
A few years ago I thought that as we began to use the internet and e-mail more and more that our collective writing skills would improve but I agree with you that that doesn’t seem to be the case.
Walt
Perfect example … I misspelled sentence above.
Hey Ian,
Ok sure…inflate my ego then pull out the hat pin!!! POP EEEEEEEEEEEEEE…SSSSSSSSssssss. [:D] Vic: Better believe the missus would have something to say about that! Roooooowwwwwrrrrrrrrr Ffffffffttt!!! [;)] That’s ok…she really knows how to stoke the fire in me. AHEM AHEM [:I] Anyhow…the term “Broad” is pretty much '70s stuff. Now it’s babes, kitty, and a few other terms sure to get you slapped. Oh well…glad I am married…and she likes trains…bonus. Still nice to be wanted. Later eh…Brian.
70s!!! Brian, the term “broad” has always struck me as a '40s thing. Along with calling women “Dames” or “Molls.” The term “Chick,” a variant on the “Bird” is universally accepted as incorrect and improper.
In our Tex-Mex culture there are a few choice words for ladies… A “ruca” is a term for a “barrio chick.” The term “Comadre” (Coh-ma-dre) is used as both respectful for not based on usage and context. An unflattering set of words are “vieja” (vee-eh-ha) insinuates an old miserable woman, while the word “***” means ***.
Terms for men are just as colorful…
A well accepted word is “vato,” (va-toe) which as a very macho. Some really bad words are “***” (pen-day-ho), which means jerk, and joto (hoe-toe) which is an unflattering term for homosexuals. Pronunciation is exaggerated and approximate, try not to use your heavy English diptongs.
In the more English part of the local language women are any of the following… gals, foxes, chicks, dudettes, babes and (unfortunately) hoes (sorry)…all inappropriate in everyday mixed converstaion. Men are referred to as guys, wolves, dudes, gentlemen (unflattering in context), individuals (also unflattering in context) and pimps.
To address a crowd one says “Hey, y’all” or “Hey, Guys.” Here the use of “guys” addresses men and women.
Capt.,
Yes you are right…started in the 40’s or there abouts. Still recall movies from the 70’s where the young uns’ were “chicks” and the older ones were "broads’. Funny…if a woman gave a guy a hard time then she was just a D _ _ _ Broad! Times have changed. How we got all this from Ian’s original post???..well…we’re guys! Later eh…Brian.
If you’ve ever read one of my political rants on the Trains magazine forums or on the Model RR forum (before they got nuked) you would know I am very Liberal (Yes, the other “L” word![:D]), but being liberal doesnt mean embracing the stupidity that seams to be ever infesting all of our supposed “cultural” institutions. Take music for example, I loath most Rap and Techno
Hey Cappy
Out here we refer to a “barrio chick” as a “Chola”, a feminine version of “Cholo”
We also have Vatos, Pachuco’s, some Cabrona’s and a lot of Piche ***'s, but I havent heard the term Joto, but *** is a very common but down.
I learned most of these from my friends and in-laws, but I grew up around a bunch of surfers, so I picked up a lot of slang from them, but I forgotten most of it. Dude or Dudette were common, Kiano Reeves made a long drawn out surfer speak “whoaaaaaa” a national inflection. but at least he never refered to someone as and Idiofrouzzer or we all be in trouble[:D]
[quote]
QUOTE: Originally posted by vsmith
If you’ve ever read one of my political rants on the Trains magazine forums or on the Model RR forum (before they got nuked) you would know I am very Liberal (Yes, the other “L” word![:D]), but being liberal doesnt mean embracing the stupidity that seams to be ever infesting all of our supposed “cultural” inst