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Americans - Pains in the Neck
Message
From
30/09/2005 11:24:04
 
 
To
30/09/2005 11:11:47
General information
Forum:
Politics
Category:
Other
Miscellaneous
Thread ID:
01052007
Message ID:
01054921
Views:
46
>><g> Plus, of course you know that an eraser over here is called a rubber?
>
>That's what we called them when I was in about grade 1 here.
>
>What I find interesting is brand names that have become all but generic names for a product. For example, hardly anyone says 'tissue'. Everybody just says 'Kleenex', even if the tissue is a Scotties or some other. Again, nobody really says 'plastic wrap', it's all just 'Saran Wrap'.

We don't vacuum - we hoover
OTOH you guys Xerox whereas we photocopy.
The ball-point pen is a Biro, btw (he WAS the inventor, after all). We're more likely to have a Bic than a Biro though!
Although we can buy Scotch Tape, our generic is Sellotape
As opposed to tissue OR Kleenex, I think we'd mostly say "paper hanky"
Q tip - cotton bud

>
>I used to work with a British guy who once threw me off by asking if he could borrow a 'Byro'. I checked myself over and then told him I must have left it in my other suit. That's when he told me it's a ball-point pen.
>
>Another is 'Scotch Tape' instead of maybe 'transparent tape'.
- Whoever said that women are the weaker sex never tried to wrest the bedclothes off one in the middle of the night
- Worry is the interest you pay, in advance, for a loan that you may never need to take out.
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