Are We Speaking The Same Language?

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Geo: 51.3287, 1.41078

I can´t believe it´s been so long. I am a true slacker. Sorry about that. I guess weekly updates were a bit idealistic. Things have been going well here. We are getting used to our surroundings and can now drive several places without the use of the TomTom. Work is good. I have been moved to a new area.... Yep, already. I am now reporting to a new person and doing a slightly different job. All is good though. Steve and I were recently back in the States for a visit. It was great to see family and friends. We also got to bring our doggy back to the UK. It is so great having her here. We try to go out and explore the area every weekend. We kind of pick a place on the map and go for a drive. These usually coincide with getting Beth behind the wheel of the Egg. She is not only getting comfortable with driving on the left but also learning to drive a manual trans. She is doing great! But anyway, on these weekend jaunts we see so many pups out and about with their humans. To put it in Steve´s words, "The whole island is a dog park!" Having that tiny dog here is so much fun!

The day after we got back we headed into Canterbury to see Aunt Beth and introduce Tiny Dog to The Blind Dog, our favorite Canterbury pub. We did not put sunglasses and a cane on Lily.... But the thought did cross our minds. Our American pup was great.

Yesterday we took her to Botany Bay for a run. She lost her puppy mind. See the video on Steve´s YouTube Page: http://youtube.com/user/sgskinny

A couple weeks ago we met a couple of my colleagues at a local pub for drinks. These visits to the local pubs are very entertaining. One could spend hours people watching. The fashion here is.... How should I put it.... Lacking. The women or girls really, wear to the pub what you would see girls in the States wear to Homecoming. And more often than not they seem to have been altered to show even more. These are the tarts. No wonder teen pregnancy is so high here. There is a term for the young men as well. They are usually dressed in trainers (tennis shoes), jeans or a track suit with a baseball cap (usually crooked on their head). They are called chavs. Our friend Eddie said that the chavs in Ramsgate are well behaved comparatively, especially if you have children.... Because most have their own children. He added that Ramsgate is one place you can find a greeting card that says, "Happy 30th Birthday, Grandma". Hilarious! Canterbury has another class of tarts and chavs.... The ones at Uni or University. Where are the parents is all I want to know. We went up to Ramsgate Brewery or Gadd´s (Eddie owns this) for a lunch. He got in a selection of Geuze beers and he wanted to broaden some horizons. These are a type of Lambic beer that are sour. Really an acquired taste.

Our weekend explorations have taken us to many places in Kent. Faversham, a medieval market town for the farmers market. We stopped at the Sportsman, a pub with a new Michelin star. This place was in the middle of nowhere but the menu looked great. We will have to making a booking.... Six weeks out! Whitstable to get fresh fish (or they say wet fish) for dinner. Steve made Mussels Provence. So yummy! To Folkstone for a drink and lunch at the Sandgate. The Sandgate was on the Gordon Ramsay show 'Kitchen Nightmares´. We spent some time poking around Pegwell Bay with its derelict hover craft port. We did a bit of fossil hunting but were unsuccessful. We did find loads of sea glass. I love sea glass so I came home with a pocket full. After some research on fossil hunting we will be setting out for more soon. I found this great website http://www.discoveringfossils.co.uk
with loads of information. There are a few locations near here that are supposed to be good for hunting. Kent is a really pretty place and the photos just don´t do it justice. I think you should all plan to visit and see it for yourselves.

The weather here has been great. Spring started the end of January and is still going. This is the longest spring I have ever experienced. It started slowly with the crocuses popping out. Then the daffodils popped up. These have been blooming for weeks now. Trees are blooming and getting leaves. Tulips are popping up now. The temperature has been hovering around the high 40s, low 50s. I think the major contributor to spring here is the length of day. Since January we have been gaining about five minutes per day. This doesn´t sound like much but it really is noticeable. Especially on Monday after sleeping in over the weekend, when I get up Monday morning it is amazing how much earlier it gets light each week. Summer is coming but here it takes it´s time.

So the title of this blog is, "Are We Speaking The Same Language?" This is a topic that I think deserves some discussion. We are all under the impression that Americans speak English and the Britons speak English..... Let me clarify this. Americans speak American English and the British speak British English..... they are more different than just an accent. There are different words for things, different phrases and completely different pronunciations for words. This is where an American can get lost. Unless you can weed through the accent and sort out what the topic is, you could get lost with one very simple word like Adidas. Yes, we all know how this is pronounced but here they completely change the word. They pronounce it A-did-as instead of A-deed-as. Then there is the jumper.... Are you thinking an outfit for a young child? Well, here a jumper is worn by adults too. It is a sweater basically. I couldn´t help but snicker every time a grown man at work would say, "Let me get my jumper." And it isn´t pronounced jumper... it´s pronounced jumpa. You see if the word ends in an R, they pronounce it as an A. And vice versa, if it ends in A, such as Diana or Tina, it´s pronounced as Dianer or Tiner. Don´t ask me..... I´m just reporting what I hear. Even the alphabet is slightly altered. H is not H, it´s hech. I first realized this dealing with hech R (HR) at work. And Z is not Z, it´s zed. I don´t really have to deal with this one but Beth´s post code is CT1 2PZ or should I say 2P zed. She tried to resist saying zed but the automated systems on the phone kept asking, "Did you say 2PC? 2PT? 2PB?" NO! 2P ZED DAMN IT!!! Poor Beth. I wonder if this is why they spell crystallization, crystallisation? If a word ends in -zation, they spell it -sation. I wonder. One thing that makes Steve crazy is the spelling of tire... it is spelled tyre. Did you know that a biscuit is a cookie here? So what do they call the fluffy thing you get at KFC? And they have KFC here. They avoid it by serving beans instead of a biscuit.... Go figure. There is also the tendency to replace a th with an f. For instance, something is pronounced somefing. Or Thanet is pronounced Fanet. ???????? Now we come to 'chip´ vs. 'crisp´ vs. 'fry´. So a chip is a fry, a crisp is a chip and a fry is, well, I don´t think they use fry. And last but not least... for some reason 'the´ is left out of the sentence, 'He was taken to the hospital.´ It is said, 'He was taken to hospital.´ Or, 'She had the baby in hospital.´ Why??? Shouldn´t there be a 'the´ in there? For whatever reason this stands out. It´s 'the´ hospital! Argh!!! My colleagues are troopers and bear with my silly questions about the language "they invented". I still think we perfected it. I am learning to recognize different British accents and know where they are from. I am also teaching my colleagues about American accents and what parts of the US they are from. This makes for fun tea breaks.

Well, that is all for now. I promise I won´t slack so long before my next entry. If you have any questions about living in the UK please ask. We may be able to answer them and if not I can find out.

Enjoy the photos. Love to all.

P.S. Lily did find what she was looking for in the compost bins (see photos). She found a baby ground hog or something. It rolled up and she got confused. She just kept pawing at it. We had to pull her away. Now she wants to keep going outside to find it again. Crazy dog.

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