h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

nice one.
truth be told i'd never-ever thought about the word used in that context.
strange, how you just accept everyday words.


Spewing and coughing fur-balls all over the gaf.

Pavement pizza? Eurgh, man, you guys...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/lancashire/the_knowledge/resolved03.shtml

"Roy Mawdsley from Accrington answers...
The derby,The origin of this term stems from an ancester of the current Lord Derby who had estates in the Isle of Man. He used to chalenge local squires to a horse race against one of his horses, large sums of money changed hands.These races became known as the local Derbys. Now any local event between two teams is known as a derby match."

So the Irish Derby is just a local event then?
And the National Derby is a contradiction of terms if not an oxymoron?
And what of Darby Gillis and the little peephole?


~jwf~

I have a friend called Darby, so the name still exists in Ireland. He's the only one I've ever met or even heard of, other than the aforementioned Darby O'Gill.

What do people feel about the phrase "an historic occasion"? There's no such thing as incorrect English, but if there were, this would be it!

I feel that it should be "a historic occasion". But bear in mind, that I fully pronounce the haitch at the start. I don't say "istoric". If you want to comment on this, please say whether you pronounce the "h" or not.

Old Hairy used "an historic" in one of his entries and claims he is backed up by some dictionary or other.

I'm with you on this one, Gnomon. It's a modern pseud pronunciation to pretend to be French and drop the aitches. I wouldn't accept it in writing from a student.
On a similar pedantry, I've just proofread a book-length manuscript changing every use of 'different than' to 'different from' just because I could

Anyone care to suggest further usages for this recent coinage by Justin Timberlake? (I know it's not really Brit Eng, but it struck me as a wonderful euphemism) Also gives added resonance to the term "boob"

jwf,
Especially given that the Lord Derby mentioned was into horse-racing, I'd guess that there may have been a national Derby horse race already in existence before his Isle of Man races, which led to his local ones becoming known as 'local Derbys', which then led to 'Derby' becoming synonymous with local matches in other area of sport.

I never wondered what "Derby" meant, as I thought it was a race (or match) between participants who had something in common. The Derby, I seem to remember, was only open to 3-year-old fillies. However, now you mention it, it is limited to locality, so perhaps I'll have to review my views.

Thanks for that link!!! That site asks a lot of the questions we've been dealing with here - e.g. Gordon Bennett, and some we haven't .... I don't remember anyone here wondering what "to curry favour" meant.

As for aspiration or not - we have had that one so often, I have come to the conclusion that we are witnessing the end of the non-aspirated "h" as we know it. But there will always be books on shelves somewhere which have "an hotel" and "an historic occasion" in them. As far as I can see, the only thing that is WRONG with saying "an historic occasion" is if you are referring to something which is happening at the present. Who is to judge if it is historic or not? Only history will tell.

Sometimes you can be pretty certain that you are present at a(n) historic occasion, without waiting for history to judge it. If you are doing something for the first time, for example. Neil Armstrong probably knew that walking on the moon was a(n) historic occasion whilst he was doing it.

What was justin's use for the phrase (assuming you mean 'a wardrobe malfunction')?

I'm a bit confused.

The curious incident of the Timberlake in the half-time...

Whilst performing (I use the word advisedly) with Janet Jackson in the half-time interval at the Superbowl, he appeared to rip her jacket from her. He later blamed the top coming undone on "a wardrobe malfunction", i.e. blaming the wardrobe department for not sewing the buttons on with sufficient thread. Nice one, Justin. Blame some unsuspecting backstage assistant for your mistake.

Ah - I see. I doubt he is blaming backstage staff though. I think he is using wardrobe to mean 'clothes', so he didn't rip it off, the clothes were faulty/unexpectedly delicate or something maybe?

Well, it sounded *to me* that he was trying to put the blame elsewhere, implicitly onto someone else. Wardrobe is shorthand for "the wardrobe department/people/person".

Well I didn't hear him say it so I don't know if he was being mailcious 'wardrobe' often just means clothes though

a wardrobe malfunction...hehehe... I think that that is delightfully ambiguous...

rolmgdao...

Not having seen it, I would agree with Kelli all the same. i.e. - her clothes didn't do what they were supposed to. At least not in front of tens of thousands of spectators and a few million viewers.

Well, if it was a just a "wardrobe malfunction" I would have expected Janet Jackson to be making the excuse, not Timberlake. The "controversy" was whether he'd tried to rip her top off, which he denied.

I'm afraid I don't agree. I don't drop the 'h', but have no problem with 'an historic'. I _do_ elide them slightly. I would be interested to know where it comes from and whether it is 'nouveau sophisticated' or related to some ancient pronunciation.

'Different from' is definitely better than 'different than', though. I believe the rationale for the second form is that it saves words.

The subject has been touched on before.

Please refer to around post 6161. And F19585?thread=261870

And I still stick by what I said in Post 6196. Not all words beginning with an "h" are non-aspirates (or whatever the word is).