Strange American sayings from an English Perspective

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  • mariposa224
    mariposa224 Posts: 1,269 Member
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    Sorry but did anyone bring up FUPA yet? That word fascinates me.

    Assuming you mean "a socially awkward or tactless act", I think you are saying it wrong. My hubby does that. Its "faux pas" and it's a real word.
    A pair of friends who are about 10 years younger than me told me this term was for a bit of female anatomy, as slang, obviously. Fat Upper P*ssy Area. Dunno if that's what the other poster meant. Kinda like when you get a front wedgie because your pants (trousers) are too tight, and there's a bulge... :embarassed:

    That's known as a camel toe over here!!
    lol It is here as well. I just meant that the "fatty area" there, would also be a "FUPA," never mind the wedgie part. :wink:
  • farway
    farway Posts: 1,264 Member
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    Question for you UK types.

    Is the Spotted **** you get in a can any good, or should I hold out for something like someone's mom used to make?

    Never tried the tinned stuff, but I bet what a mum's mate used to make is loads better

    see what I did there? Tinned &mum
  • farway
    farway Posts: 1,264 Member
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    Question for you UK types.

    Is the Spotted **** you get in a can any good, or should I hold out for something like someone's mom used to make?

    Never tried the tinned stuff, but I bet what a mum's mate used to make is loads better

    see what I did there? Tinned & mum
  • jenluvsushi
    jenluvsushi Posts: 933 Member
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    As someone who works in the correctional system, I hear a lot of phrases that have gone from the joint to the street over the years. I have been hearing "butt-hurt" or "my bad" since the 90's. Pretty sure “home-boy” and a few others are from prison too. I also am literally from BFE so that is not necessarily a southern saying as I am a mid-westerner. My Dad was in the Army so maybe that’s where I got it from? He was also the kind of guy who had sayings for all types of things that used to get on my last nerve as a teen but now I love. For instance: she fell off of the ugly tree and hit every branch on the way down or it's like two monkeys trying to **** a football. God I miss him.....and now I am saying those same sayings that used to bother and embarrass me so much, lol!
  • LINIA
    LINIA Posts: 1,126 Member
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    THE A& E compared to using the ER in the United States

    Accident & Emergency

    Emergency Room


    (of course, we followed Webster, and i've been told you guys didn't think much of him in the UK :laugh: :laugh: )
  • rml_16
    rml_16 Posts: 16,414 Member
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    As someone who works in the correctional system, I hear a lot of phrases that have gone from the joint to the street over the years. I have been hearing "butt-hurt" or "my bad" since the 90's. Pretty sure “home-boy” and a few others are from prison too. I also am literally from BFE so that is not necessarily a southern saying as I am a mid-westerner. My Dad was in the Army so maybe that’s where I got it from? He was also the kind of guy who had sayings for all types of things that used to get on my last nerve as a teen but now I love. For instance: she fell off of the ugly tree and hit every branch on the way down or it's like two monkeys trying to **** a football. God I miss him.....and now I am saying those same sayings that used to bother and embarrass me so much, lol!
    "My bad" is right up there with "bling" or "bling bling" as two of my most-hated slang phrases/words.
  • SavvyGurl0528
    SavvyGurl0528 Posts: 228 Member
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    Sorry but did anyone bring up FUPA yet? That word fascinates me.

    Assuming you mean "a socially awkward or tactless act", I think you are saying it wrong. My hubby does that. Its "faux pas" and it's a real word.
    And French!

    But I wonder if FUPA is along the lines of SNAFU and FUBAR, in which case I'm not researcing on my work computer!
    Oh my, do you really not know what it stands for? "Fat Upper P--- Area" :laugh:
    Oh yes. I did see that once around here. I forgot. I know why now! lol

    Boy is my face red, lol. I will def make sure my DH stops saying it now!
  • jadethief
    jadethief Posts: 266 Member
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    Here's one my co-worker just said to me when I asked if she would be at work tomorrow:

    "Lord willin' and the creek don't rise!"
  • Shikonneko
    Shikonneko Posts: 187 Member
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    Here's another one. The road next to the highway/interstate, do you call it: 1) access road 2)feeder road 3) service road or 4)something completely different?

    Outer road, actually.
  • ImSoOTired
    ImSoOTired Posts: 186 Member
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    Question for you UK types.

    Is the Spotted **** you get in a can any good, or should I hold out for something like someone's mom used to make?

    Never eaten it to be honest, but I have to be honest I prefer homemade with things like that. Can give you a recipe if you like

    spottedDpud_zps60d552ac.jpg

    ^^This looks delicious
  • Fullsterkur_woman
    Fullsterkur_woman Posts: 2,712 Member
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    OMG! Real Mincemeat is my favorite pie in the universe. I can't find it around here anymore. I like mine with lard and venison.
    Maybe I'll send you one for the holidays then (see what I did there? :wink: ), because I make it with suet and venison that I ground up myself after my friend shot and butchered it. (apologies to rml_16) If lard works just as well as suet, it'd make my job a whole lot easier!
  • Fullsterkur_woman
    Fullsterkur_woman Posts: 2,712 Member
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    Here's one my co-worker just said to me when I asked if she would be at work tomorrow:

    "Lord willin' and the creek don't rise!"
    How 'bout "can't dance, never could sing, and it's too wet to plow"?
  • Camera_BagintheUK
    Camera_BagintheUK Posts: 707 Member
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    Ahhh some more(not as good):-

    "You don't know squat"

    "Fanny pack" ..... that ones ssooo funny!!

    "I'm doing the math" ....it's "Maths" not "Math"

    "Vacation" .... no it's not it's a holiday!

    "He was pissed" ..... In England this would mean he was very drunk

    see, I never understood calling it "maths" instead of math. Why is it plural? Now, "doing the numbers" that fine. But not maths. It just looks wrong to me.

    Maths is short for mathematics

    Also, it's Valentines Day not Valentines, and New Years Eve/Day or Hogmanay not New Years :angry:
  • rml_16
    rml_16 Posts: 16,414 Member
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    Ahhh some more(not as good):-

    "You don't know squat"

    "Fanny pack" ..... that ones ssooo funny!!

    "I'm doing the math" ....it's "Maths" not "Math"

    "Vacation" .... no it's not it's a holiday!

    "He was pissed" ..... In England this would mean he was very drunk

    see, I never understood calling it "maths" instead of math. Why is it plural? Now, "doing the numbers" that fine. But not maths. It just looks wrong to me.

    Maths is short for mathematics

    Also, it's Valentines Day not Valentines, and New Years Eve/Day or Hogmanay not New Years :angry:
    We do call them Valentine's (NOT Valentines) Day and New Year's Eve/Day. We just shorten them when we write and speak because lazy.
  • Camera_BagintheUK
    Camera_BagintheUK Posts: 707 Member
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    "Fanny pack" ..... that ones ssooo funny!! - No one below the age of 70 would either wear or purchase one of those hideous things, so pretty much not a real staple of American life.

    It's not Americans wearing fanny packs that is funny. It's the name fanny pack. A fanny means something completely different in the UK. My Brit friend delicately calls it a "lady's front bottom," and the word fanny is apparently almost as offensive there as the c-word is here. And the c-word is used pretty casually there.

    no, the C word is still really offensive even though it's used a lot.
  • rml_16
    rml_16 Posts: 16,414 Member
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    OMG! Real Mincemeat is my favorite pie in the universe. I can't find it around here anymore. I like mine with lard and venison.
    Maybe I'll send you one for the holidays then (see what I did there? :wink: ), because I make it with suet and venison that I ground up myself after my friend shot and butchered it. (apologies to rml_16) If lard works just as well as suet, it'd make my job a whole lot easier!
    It's OK. :happy:

    I actually have no problem with hunting and people who eat meat. I just can't do it anymore.
  • Shikonneko
    Shikonneko Posts: 187 Member
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    Why do a lot of the septics on here WRITE insignificant words in capital letters or *put* them in asterisks. It doesn't add any emphasis, it takes it away.
    Why do they describe losing weight as a journey? When you were putting on weight was that a journey too?
    Why do some of them boast about being sarcastic?
    Why have they replaced thank you very much with thank you so much?
    Why did that woman from North Carolina that I was sitting next to on a plane tell me I was going to burn in hell and that my cat didn't go to heaven? I loved that bloody cat.
    "Septics"????
    I know, right?

    And what is this, the end of an episode of "Soap"?! :laugh: (really dating myself now!)
    :flowerforyou: Soap was/is awesome.
  • Camera_BagintheUK
    Camera_BagintheUK Posts: 707 Member
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    "Vacation" .... no it's not it's a holiday!


    Holiday for us Americans are days like Christmas, Thanksgiving, Easter, Valentine's Day, Halloween. Not a trip. :tongue:

    We have 8 "Bank Holidays" - New Year's Day; Good Friday; Easter Monday; 1st and last Monday in May; Last Monday in August; Christmas Day, Boxing Day (26th Dec). Valentine's Day and Halloween aren't holidays here and we don't celebrate Thanksgiving.

    But we still use the word holiday for what you call vacation. Interestingly though, when I was a student back in the '80s we referred to the breaks as Vacations - don't know if students do that?

    BTW school in the UK is where you go between 5 and 16 or 18; college is a further educational (FE) esablishement for 16+ and University is a Higher Educational (HE) establishment for 18+. Universities can offer and validate their own awards, colleges offer awards that are nationally available.
  • Camera_BagintheUK
    Camera_BagintheUK Posts: 707 Member
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    One word: Bollocks.

    That's two! :bigsmile:
  • jbuck93
    jbuck93 Posts: 89 Member
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    Do other people use the phrase the *kitten* hole of no where to describe, in somewhat derogratory terms somewhere small/out of the way/no where near anything interesting.

    We end the south use the phrase "BFE" or "bum f\/cked eqypt" to describe the middle of nowhere/small town.

    For example
    "where are you from in Alabama?"
    "BFE"
    "oh, so a pretty rural place, huh?"

    I have no idea where this phrase came from.
    Must be pretty specific to where you live. I know I'm a Yank and all, but I've lived in the South (rural Georgia and north Florida) for almost nine years and I know a lot of southerners, including half my BF's family. I have never heard that phrase.

    I'm from north Idaho and we say it here.

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