Your Forum - Do you want to change it?

[tikay]

Nah, cant. I learned reading, but was absent when they taught writing. As you can tell.

[ifm]

just as a slight aside, have you ever tried to order straight coffee in america?
I tried (the bird, a yank, i was with ordered some double white mocca with a twist of chocolate something jobbie) and they had to ask me 3 times!! what i wanted, just straight coffee and starbucks were nonplussed!

[tikay]

This has deffo become a "Kennel Thread".

[ifm]

lol, just lost 2 sng's in 5 mins!!
good job i'm just venting my anger in $5 jobbies

[Colchester Kev]

also the "septics"  have no understanding of what a white coffee is, you ask for a coffee and they ask " how would you like it" you say "white" and they look at you with a blank expression and ask again....then after 2 minutes of a stand off they say do you mean with cream....... Im sure its US that should celebrate independance day not them !!!

[ifm]

i got on a bus (cuz the tram was bust) in minneapolis and asked if i could use my ticket from the tram on the bus (i was told i could beforehand) and the driver asked me 3 times to repeat myself (said "huh" 3 times) before someone behind me said "it's ok he's english" and translated for me.
The driver said "ahhh", and said louder (like i was hard of hearing) "you should have said that in the first place"
muppet, the urge to beat him round the head while singing rule britannia was overwhelming

[RED-DOG]

About 12 years ago I was invited to go to the states to stay with some Native Americans for a few weeks. Although they are modernised now they still try to keep there history and identity alive, so for a month or so each year they erect tepees on tribal land and live the old way. They let me join in with many of their activities including a form of rugby where the whole tribe takes part, the women can run with the ball (rawhide stuffed with grass) but when the men have it they must stand still and throw it. We hollowed out box turtles to make rattles and, honour of honours; I took part in a POW wow.

Anyway, the point of the story is, Id been warned about the difficulty in getting a proper cup of tea and I cant live without it, so I took with me some tea bags, a small kettle, and a kettle prop (used to suspend the kettle over a fire)

The Indians took great interest in my tea making ritual and sat around with solemn faces as I brewed up, eventually one and then another were persuaded to try a sip, some hated it but some really liked it. When I went home I gave my remaining teabags to the one that liked it the most and he made me a dream-catcher from beads and dried sinews and a tail feather from a whip o will, it hangs above me as I write.

[ifm]

as barmy as a barm pot

[tikay]

I'm sure this is just a bad dream. It started off as a deadly serious thread, and looks where it's ended.

And whats a "dream catcher"?

[RED-DOG]

I'm sure this is just a bad dream. It started off as a deadly serious thread, and looks where it's ended.

And whats a "dream catcher"?

Im not telling you, you didnt believe me about the sand boy

[tikay]

No, & I was correct.

I looked up sand flea in the OED. "another name for the chigoe or the sand-hopper". No mention of sand boy.

I looked up sand boy in th OED. "Jolly". No mention of sand flea.

Don't mess with tikay, see?

[tikay]

Oh go on, tell us what a dream catcher is. We promise to believe you.

[RED-DOG]

No, & I was correct.

I looked up sand flea in the OED. "another name for the chigoe or the sand-hopper". No mention of sand boy.

I looked up sand boy in th OED. "Jolly". No mention of sand flea.

Don't mess with tikay, see?

HAPPY AS A SANDBOY
[Q] From Niki Wessels, South Africa; a related question came from Robert Metcalf in Singapore: Our family recently discussed the expression happy as a sandboy, and wondered where and how it originated. My dictionary informs me that a sandboy is a kind of fleabut why a boy, and why is it happy?
[A] Let me add an explanatory note to your question, as American readers have probably never heard this saying. It is mostly known in Britain and the Commonwealth, though it is not so common these days even in those countries. The first examples we know about are from London at the beginning of the nineteenth century. Another form current at the time was as jolly as a sandboy. Both are proverbial sayings that suggest a carefree and untroubled state of mind.
None of my reference works hint at a connection with fleas (sand fleas exist, of course, but they hardly seem relevant). However, a writer in Notes & Queries in 1866, answering much the same query as yours, comments that: Sandboy is the vulgar name of a small insect which may be found in the loose sand so common on the seashore. This insect hops and leaps in a manner strongly suggestive of jollity, and hence I imagine the simile arises. So your dictionary is part-right: it was once a colloquial or dialect word for a sand flea.

I will accept a formal apology

[BlueWolf]

seein as tom has gone about summat else lol it seems lol a dream cathcher is sorta similair to a mobile that you usually hang above a babies bed, or a windchime without the bells. Usually made from bone and other natural items they were made by native americans in the belief that they "caught" bad dreams and enabled the owner a nightmare free sleep.


See i'm not stupid

[RED-DOG]

Thank you BlueWolf, I was waiting for him to say I made the whole Indian thing up, (I have the photo's)