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Heaven: 2021 Proof Americans and Brits speak a different language

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  • Sojourner wrote: »
    Sorry to hear; it was 30p last time I was desperate to pee at Victoria station...

    It's free in all underground stations that have one, now.
  • That’s reassuring
  • We don't see pay toilets anymore here. It is common to pull over on a highway and pee. Low population and traffic make it possible.
  • We don't see pay toilets anymore here. It is common to pull over on a highway and pee. Low population and traffic make it possible.

    Well, that works if you're a guy--or exhibitionist, I suppose.
  • We don't see pay toilets anymore here. It is common to pull over on a highway and pee. Low population and traffic make it possible.

    Well, that works if you're a guy--or exhibitionist, I suppose.

    Or living in Québec, regardless of traffic density.
  • We don't see pay toilets anymore here. It is common to pull over on a highway and pee. Low population and traffic make it possible.

    Well, that works if you're a guy--or exhibitionist, I suppose.

    Yeah, my internship supervisor and I (very rural context, 3 of 4 church buildings had no toilets) came to the conclusion that the reason it took a long time to ordain women had nothing to do with theology and everything to do with indoor plumbing!
  • Free at main railway/railroad/train stations now, too.
  • la vie en rougela vie en rouge Purgatory Host, Circus Host
    70 cents in Toulouse station the other day. Maybe I'm odd, but I'm always encouraged to see a toilet you have to pay for. It means it's going to be clean, which is far from given when it's free.
  • I am now fascinated to learn that Quebec apparently endorses, ah, minimal plumbing. Or am I missing the point?
  • We don't see pay toilets anymore here. It is common to pull over on a highway and pee. Low population and traffic make it possible.

    Well, that works if you're a guy--or exhibitionist, I suppose.

    We do his and hers, plus dog. When our kids (daughters all) were with us, it was a group thing. Including dog. I do have a copy of "How to Shit in the Woods", which devotes some discussion on how not to pee on your feet when squatting, and otherwise how to answer nature's call with finesse.
  • Sounds like an excellent Boy Scout book!
  • Sojourner wrote: »
    More like the generation before. I’m closer to 69 than 68 and haven’t heard that turn of phrase in over 50 years.

    Back in the day it cost 2 pence to use the loos in railway stations ( needed 2 old pennies in the slot to get the damned door open) ...

    When you find one that only costs 1d you can let the other penny drop.
  • Oz did away with pennies in 1966....
  • orfeoorfeo Suspended
    Also, seeing toilets that you have to pay for is pretty rare in Australia anyway.
  • Gee DGee D Shipmate
    edited February 2021
    Sojourner wrote: »
    Oz did away with pennies in 1966....

    "On the fourteenth of February
    Nineteen sixty six." (Sung to Click go the Shears for those of you of younger years).
  • BroJamesBroJames Purgatory Host
    I don’t know that Click go the Shears is much known outside Oz, though the tune (with different words) apparently originated in the American Civil War.
  • I certainly know it (UK)
  • Gee DGee D Shipmate
    BroJames wrote: »
    I don’t know that Click go the Shears is much known outside Oz, though the tune (with different words) apparently originated in the American Civil War.

    Wikipedia says:

    The tune is the American Civil War song "Ring the Bell, Watchman" by Henry Clay Work and the first verse follows closely, in parody, Work's lyrics as well.

    The name is given in red, so no link to the words. Does any US shipmate know them please?
  • BroJamesBroJames Purgatory Host
    There’s a version here with links at the foot of the page to other related songs. The ‘Strike the bell’ link takes you through to a page about the author.
  • We also had a song for decimalisation, which I learned in primary school. It went to the tune of the 12 days of Christmas and ran:
    On the fourteenth day of February 1971
    There’s going to be
    Decimal currency
    With a hundred pennies in a pound.
  • I know the tune of Click go the shears, but didn't recognise the words, not even the Rolf Harris version that came up on YouTube (we had an album of his songs as children). I think I must have sung or heard Ring the Bell Watchman (link to Maddy Prior on YouTube) at some point as that chorus I remember
  • Never heard of it under either name. Civil War was longer ago than my great-grandparents were alive.
  • Gee DGee D Shipmate
    BroJames wrote: »
    There’s a version here with links at the foot of the page to other related songs. The ‘Strike the bell’ link takes you through to a page about the author.

    Thanks, had never heard of the song or author
    Cathscats wrote: »
    We also had a song for decimalisation, which I learned in primary school. It went to the tune of the 12 days of Christmas and ran:
    On the fourteenth day of February 1971
    There’s going to be
    Decimal currency
    With a hundred pennies in a pound.

    What is there about 14 February? Can't be St Valentine, he's not concerned with money.
  • BroJames wrote: »
    I don’t know that Click go the Shears is much known outside Oz.

    I (in the UK) remembered it when I saw it mentioned, but only because many years ago an Australian friend of my mother sent us a cassette of this for Christmas.

  • Henry Clay Work was responsible for that golden oldie “My Grandfather’s Clock”
  • Sojourner wrote: »
    Henry Clay Work was responsible for that golden oldie “My Grandfather’s Clock”

    I loved that song as a child. Musical taste was never one of my strong points.
  • Work is distantly related to the late Diana, Princess of Wales.
  • Gee DGee D Shipmate
    Did she know anything abut work, though?
  • From another thread:
    Not sure what is meant by a "flannel" perhaps face cloth or wash cloth.

    Yup, Brits call face cloths 'flannels'. They must once have been made out of flannel (which I think of as a fairly smooth sort of cloth) but these days they're basically made out of towelling.
  • Fawkes Cat wrote: »
    From another thread:
    Not sure what is meant by a "flannel" perhaps face cloth or wash cloth.

    Yup, Brits call face cloths 'flannels'. They must once have been made out of flannel (which I think of as a fairly smooth sort of cloth) but these days they're basically made out of towelling.

    Being the passive-aggressive bastard that I am, I pull this example out to use against British types who are snottily insisting some Americanism is stupid because its meaning has evolved past its etymology.
  • Are “face cloths” what I and others in the American South would call “wash cloths”?
  • Nick Tamen wrote: »
    Are “face cloths” what I and others in the American South would call “wash cloths”?

    And the American northwest.
  • And Midwest.
  • MMMMMM Shipmate
    Tangent: on holiday in Argentina, in the days when we were allowed holidays, we realised we needed to buy more flannels/face cloths/wash cloths as the hotel we were in at the time didn’t provide them. So we went to the local supermarket and bought a couple of nice terry towelling cloths - they were a bit big but the best we could do.

    When we got them back to hotel, we realised they were probably tea towels. We had visions of the hotel staff saying, ‘oh, that’s interesting, in England the flannels are just like tea towels’....

    MMM
  • KarlLBKarlLB Shipmate
    edited March 2021
    Flannel < Welsh Gwlanen < Gwlân, wool. Or at least that's the most guessed at etymology. Alternatively may have come via Norman French. Ultimately from proto-Celtic *wlanā either way.
  • orfeoorfeo Suspended
    Here it wouldn't be a flannel, face cloth or wash cloth (though I'd at least recognise "face cloth").

    To me it's a face washer. Or possibly even a facewasher.
  • mousethief wrote: »
    Fawkes Cat wrote: »
    From another thread:
    Not sure what is meant by a "flannel" perhaps face cloth or wash cloth.

    Yup, Brits call face cloths 'flannels'. They must once have been made out of flannel (which I think of as a fairly smooth sort of cloth) but these days they're basically made out of towelling.

    Being the passive-aggressive bastard that I am, I pull this example out to use against British types who are snottily insisting some Americanism is stupid because its meaning has evolved past its etymology.

    So let me also give you for free from Anglo-English:

    - choo-choo train (ok, maybe not used all that widely in polite adult company).

    - giving someone a ring on the telephone.
  • KarlLBKarlLB Shipmate
    edited March 2021
    Choo-choo, along with puff-puff and puffer train, is usually employed to wind up steam enthusiasts; paging @Baptist Trainfan
  • Gee DGee D Shipmate
    orfeo wrote: »
    Here it wouldn't be a flannel, face cloth or wash cloth (though I'd at least recognise "face cloth").

    To me it's a face washer. Or possibly even a facewasher.

    You're young Orfeo - to us, growing up in the 40s and 50s, it was a flannel or face washer.
  • orfeo wrote: »
    To me it's a face washer. Or possibly even a facewasher.

    To me (UK) that sounds like a machine that washes your face for you (maybe by analogy with 'dishwasher').

  • orfeoorfeo Suspended
    orfeo wrote: »
    To me it's a face washer. Or possibly even a facewasher.

    To me (UK) that sounds like a machine that washes your face for you (maybe by analogy with 'dishwasher').

    I'm sure it does! A bit of research suggests it's unique to Australia.

    Of course, once upon a time a dishwasher was a person not a machine... so I'm going to argue the mechanics of how the face is washed aren't specified.
  • If you're going to use a flannel/ face cloth/ facewasher make sure you only use it for your face: if you need to employ one for your body have a separate cloth.
  • Why?
  • Depending on what bits you wash with your flannel, etc, do you want it on your face?
  • Don’t care

    Mind you in my days as a junior nurse when doing a “ sponge bath” one started with face then hands then genitalia then feet....

    A dear old lady one said to me “just me face and me bum, love, in no particular order”😂I still smile at the memory...
  • Personally I don’t care
  • jedijudyjedijudy Heaven Host
    Oh, I care a lot! yuck
  • SparrowSparrow Shipmate
    Reminds me of Granny Weatherwax's (Discworld) reply: "I just does all the bits. As and when they become available."
  • Am I the only one who never uses a flannel or one of those nylon scrunchies in the shower? I prefer to use my bare hands to wash myself with. Similar to my aversion to doing the dishes using a dishcloth, horrible germy things ....if I have to wash up by hand I need a brush. A clean one.
  • I never use a flannel to wash either, never have, even when having to wash myself in the work toilet basins after cycling in (top half then bottom half, stripping off to wash half, dressing and then the other half).

    I do use a sponge with a scouring pad to wash up and a brush but bleach them regularly.
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