Wednesday, April 27, 2005
American English as she is spoke
Mike Houser's fine CasdraBlog links to an intriguing test of the American English I speak.
Altho' my English accent has, if anything, got even plummier since moving to the US, I never stop absorbing and adopting new vocabulary that takes my fancy or just plain gets the job done, so I was keen to see how well I've adapted.
Before going into my score, two questions stumped me:
The act of covering a house or area in front of a house with toilet paper is called ...
- Toilet papering
- Rolling
- TP'ing
I have never even heard of such a jape. Seriously? Someone swathing a house in bog bumpf?
And there's an actual VERB for it? I see. Well, and is there also a verb for smearing my enemy's satchel with chunky peanut butter mixed with Hershey's genuine chocolate flavor syrup? Or the act of draping spaghetti around the spokes of my ex-wife's mountain bike?
I'm also asked What do I call "an easy class", the possible answers being
- A crip course
- A gut
- A blow off (which sounds terribly rude)
Now, the moment you've all being waiting for: My Linguistic Profile:
- 50% General American English
- 25% Yankee
- 20% Dixie
- 5% Upper Midwestern
- 0% Midwestern (phew, right?)
