Forum: Editors/Reviewers Hangout

Ernest, I think what we have here is a more recent usage. I hear the physical use of 'intercede' from teachers all the time ("I interceded on the child's behalf", meaning we called the police, not "we talked to the abusive parents". Both are verbal, but it's an escalation beyond mere talking.

An escalation beyond mere talking is the end result, but the teacher is not going beyond mere talking. By calling 911, the teacher pleaded for a higher authority to intervene. Even using Ernest's original definition, the use of intercede by the teacher is correct.

I tend to agree, editors can and do proofread, but that's not all they do. If all they do is proofread, they aren't editing. Not a conclusive or exhaustive list, but editors also consider continuity, style, when a scene is too short or long, or wordy or terse, and give advice about where a story should go or end. They catch errors that proofreaders are not concerned with. Their understanding of a story is greater than that of a proofreader. I may be wrong, I am only a proofreader, but at least some editors provide some of those services. If a proofreader starts to do the same, he has to put on his editor hat.

Besides, I don't mind paying $20 for a haircut, and never have.

Electric clippers & a #2 comb work for me.
I stopped paying for hair cuts after I shortened my hair length (it was about half way down my back).
The #2 used to be good for a couple of months, these days it seems to last for 6 months before I need another trim.

Electric clippers & a #2 comb work for me.

And they have worked for me for over a decade. I just keep it neat and even as there is no one for me to try and impress.

I stopped paying for hair cuts after I shortened my hair length (it was about half way down my back).

I haven't paid for a haircut in decades. OTOH I haven shaved or cut my hair at all for decades.

The few stories I've submitted to SOL I've edited myself and it shows - trying to edit your own stories is like trying to cut your own hair - it never ends well.

You'll get better with more experience, it's just the way things happen.

Better is relative. Even after 20 years of writing (legal) documents I still missed some typos or wrong references when reading for mistakes.
There is one SOL author who seems to use a spell check without considering the word being inserted (or not corrected) - he/she badly needs someone to read through before publication.
I agree with those who feel a third party should do a final reading.

It can be difficult to find a content editor. So many of them are unhappy. You may be hoarding proofreaders. Some people have hordes of them. To deal with too many squicks you need at least two.

The homonym Police have inspected this email. It was posted on a site for Editors/Reviewers.

And probably by doing so it will change him from unhappy to content.

Depends on how much hair you have. The balder you get the less you want to pay a barber $20 or more to cut your hair. When I was very young, my dad would cut my hair, and give me a nickel if I didn't squirm, much. Of course when you are under ten you don't much care how your hair looks.

We also need to be careful not to use big guns when the little pistols are best - use the simple to understand words where you can, not the fancy complex ones that have every reader reaching for a dictionary.

A point of view I have seen a lot, but I don't think it is universal. Methinks where you can isn't the same as where you should.

It will certainly make the work easier to read for more people, but sometimes a specific 'fancy complex' word will add a nuance of meaning that can be difficult to construct from a few simple ones. And besides, I revel in the richness of the language and delight in the entertainment strong complex wording can provide.

I know editors that try hard to include appropriate lesser known and used words, and I applaud them for their courage. If nothing else, it can broaden a reader's vocabulary.

The UK press, which has a long tradition of standing up for standards in English English

Some premier examples of the press here down under could also be relied upon to hold up the standards of the Queen's English, but sadly they no longer do so. US spelling, words in the wrong context, missing words, and just plain wrong words, now regularly appear in print even in the flagship rags.

In my far away youth I copy read for a newspaper, so I know what the pressure to get it right was like. I am confident the standards have slipped severely.

Some might say that due to modern social networking and other instant global communications, that the English language is undergoing some form of levelling at a rate not experienced before. If that is so, does it have to be at the expense of ALL the standards that have made the language so precise?

Sometimes I think I put Grumpy Old Men to shame.

and they rely solely on the spell checker in the software.

I suspect in many cases these days even the spell checker isn't used. I've seen things posted online & even printed that running a basic spell check (let alone a grammar check) would have picked up.

default setting of using US spelling

Never in the annals of human history was so much confusion and argument created by a single person for such a misguided and arrogant reason as was done by Noah Webster. I hate him most days.

Never in the annals of human history was so much confusion and argument created by a single person for such a misguided and arrogant reason as was done by Noah Webster. I hate him most days.

Why? Do you imagine that Webster is some how responsible for variations in spelling between the UK and the US? Do you imagine that he is somehow responsible for default spell check settings in computer programs written a century or more after his death?

If so, you are wrong on both counts.

You want a word processor that doesn't default to a US based dictionary for spell check? Find a word processor that wasn't written by a US based company.

Do you imagine that Webster is some how responsible for variations in spelling between the UK and the US

Absolutely I do. His original Blue-Backed Speller contained lots of unilateral changes to English spelling for the US market. In fact 'As time went on, Webster changed the spellings in the book to more phonetic ones' (Wikipedia).

If Webster had retained the standard English spellings in his speller, we would almost certainly not have our current spelling schism.

I say misguided because he thought he was making things better, instead of worse; and I say arrogant, because he thought his specific audience was the only one that mattered.

And if you think the speller wasn't all that impactful, just consider that it is second only to the Bible in the number of copies sold in the US.

Absolutely I do. His original Blue-Backed Speller contained lots of unilateral changes to English spelling for the US market. In fact 'As time went on, Webster changed the spellings in the book to more phonetic ones' (Wikipedia).

I doubt you can actually prove that those changes were unilateral. Most were likely already in common use in the Americas. If you actually look at texts written in the Americas in the early to mid 1700s there was a huge amount of variation in spellings, even by fairly well educated writers.

I say misguided because he thought he was making things better, instead of worse

He was making things better, its just that an already developing US dialect not "standard English" was his starting point

And if you think the speller wasn't all that impactful, just consider that it is second only to the Bible in the number of copies sold in the US.

No, it's not that I think it wasn't impactful as written, it's that I think it would have had far less impact if he stuck with standard English as you suggest.

I am sure that there were spellers published in England that did follow "standard English" available in the US at the time. You maybe need to think about why his might have been so much more popular.

Don't forget that this was the period immediately before and after the American Revolution. Things English were not all that popular then.

I doubt you can actually prove that those changes were unilateral.

I can't 'prove' anything. I can only go on what history records as his motives. They did not reference anything other than his own ideas and beliefs.

One of those was his notion that spelling should be 'phonetic' without realising that would mean many significantly different spellings for the same English words all over the planet. A recipe for disaster if even thought about for a short time.

I have never entertained the notion that correct spelling should be popular. Just correct.

The main reason (again from the historical account) that his spelling book became so popular was because of the woefully inadequate availability of proper texts and tuition for the masses of students in the US at that time. Something not mirrored in other countries.

Remember that the US has currently fewer than one quarter of the English speaking population on the planet, and a much smaller percentage back then, but that the rest of us didn't see the need to rush headlong into rewriting the language. Neither it seems did any other American.

Righteous isolationism doesn't even begin to describe it. It is an emotive subject for me because I have to make adjustments for the insanity many times every day. And for no good reason that I can see.

They did not reference anything other than his own ideas and beliefs.

Yes, but to claim he acted unilaterally, you have to show that those beliefs were uniquely his as opposed to being beliefs held in common with others in the Americas at the time.

to claim he acted unilaterally, you have to show that those beliefs were uniquely his

Not sure about that.

Because unilaterally means 'undertaken by one party' and 'one sided' I would have though acting unilaterally meant that the side of the argument that aligned with his beliefs was the one he undertook exclusively, by himself, regardless of how many others may or may not have taken 'that side'.

The historical record shows that his motivations were his alone based on personal beliefs, and that he acted on them alone. Whether those views were held by others doesn't impact 'unilateral'.

Interestingly, he knew at the time that he was acting against the commonly held dogma, and probably revelled in it as 'a great reformer'.

In my far away youth I copy read for a newspaper, so I know what the pressure to get it right was like. I am confident the standards have slipped severely.

Yes; very very severely. I read two London online versions of major newspapers and every day there are howlers. Sometimes it is howlers like mixing up stationary and stationery, too much reliance on spell check, the import of foreign words with incorrect use (like the misuse of billion), sometimes hyperbation and what looks like a catachresis but is still wrong order.

What are you calling a misuse of billion? 10^9 or 10^12?

Technically both are correct as long as they are used in the correct scale.

In the short scale a billion is 10^9, in the long scale a billion is 10^12.

Looking at my trusty American reference book (The Readers Digest) the correct name for one thousand million is a milliard and a billion is one million millions.

It goes on to say (and I remember this also being published by the Financial Times) that The Times wrote that in future they were going to use the American million (aka milliard).

The author goes on to write that this is likely to cause misunderstanding and it would be better to write "a thousand millions" or "a million millions" as appropriate. He or she then warns about trillions, quadrillions and so forth.

"the British government officially adopted the short scale in 1974
This is not France - there is no control over the use of words, otherwise I would not be afraid of using a three letter word starting ga to describe a young girl's joyful behaviour. What I quoted was first published in 1985.

Looking at my trusty American reference book (The Readers Digest) the correct name for one thousand million is a milliard and a billion is one million millions.

If you read my link, that is a variant on the long scale that names the left out groups of three for the long scale. That does not make the use of the short scale incorrect.

1. Readers Digest is not a reference book and I would recommend against quoting it as an authoritative source for anything. The article you saw in Readers digest was likely explaining the Long scale for American readers who are unfamiliar with it.

2. The US has used the short scale since the 1700s.

3. I know that there is no control over words. However with the British Government officially adopting the short scale, all government documents such as budgets and press releases would be written using the short scale. The London Financial Times likely decided that it was easier to convert to the short scale than to keep translating government reports / budgets into the long scale.

1. Readers Digest is not a reference book and I would recommend against quoting it as an authoritative source for anything. The article you saw in Readers digest was likely explaining the Long scale for American readers who are unfamiliar with it.

Article???? This is a reference book of 688 pages on the use of individual words and all the named contributors are lecturers or Fellows specialising in Linguistics or English at varied universities and are MAs or PhD or equivalent. In addition there are articles on the differences between the various brands of English worldwide and each holds as a minimum an MA in

Article???? This is a reference book of 688 pages on the use of individual words and all the named contributors are lecturers or Fellows specialising in Linguistics or English at varied universities and are MAs or PhD or equivalent.

Sorry, the only Readers Digest that I an most Americans are familiar with is a popular periodical.

https://order.readersdigest.com/pubs/RD/RDA/lp_rda_oad6_respcc_sem.jsp?cds_page_id=115170&cds_mag_code=RDA&id=1446738965039&lsid=53090956050032428&vid=1&atrkid=V1ADW5FDE06F5-18464402830-k-reader%27s+digest-61040745670-e-g-m-1t1&cds_response_key=IDYIA008

my trusty American reference book (The Readers Digest)

I certainly understood this to mean a real reference book; perhaps sejintenej could have made this more explicitly clear by adding 'from' after the open-bracket. OTOH, I have some refernce books from RD (various UK flora/fauna) so I was well aware of RD's reference books.

Edit: Snarky remark about US attitudes considered and rejected.

RD reference books are common in the US as well though a large proportion of them are written as an easy read rather than an academic style. I use two or three for basic reference in the garden and know my local library stocks more than one of them.
In recent years they do seem to be aiming more down-market though, which may be why "most" Americans know them as a popular periodical.

RD reference books are common in the US as well though a large proportion of them are written as an easy read rather than an academic style.

Mine is entitled "The Right Word at the Right Time" with a sub heading "A guide to the English Language and how to us it" (the latter being in block capitals). First edition (and copyright) 1985 - no mention of a later edition.

In recent years they do seem to be aiming more down-market though, which may be why "most" Americans know them as a popular periodical

Well known over here for littering second hand market stalls, they seem to Bowdlerise books which have already been Bowdlerised. ( any alternative word for such a downbeat insulting word?)

( any alternative word for such a downbeat insulting word?)

Per Wikipedia (why anyone would give the various Wikis any credence is another matter), your options are:
Bowdlerize ‎
1.Alternative form of bowdlerize
or
Bowdlerise ‎
1.Alternative form of bowdlerize

Since it is a word derived from an English name and was developed in the UK, the implication by Wikipedia that the letter 'z' is the original does somewhat remove their credibility as a reliable source.

I think bastardisation is a good alternative though.
(Also spelt with a 'z' in Wikipedia).

Bowdlerised. ( any alternative word for such a downbeat insulting word?)

Bowdler was a kinky so-'n-so who lived at a time when any view of a leg was expected to cause men to commit rape or worse. One result was that skirts were put in tables etc. to hide their legs from lascivious male eyes (I kid you not). Bowdler himself was notorious for removing the slightest doubtful reference in written materials such as books.
A Franciscan Friar friend told me that with all the begats etc he considered the Bible one of the most pornographic books he had read - I wonder what Bowdler did to it

Well, he did somewhat shorten Shakespeare, but I don't know if he did any others.

I'm an Australian and often run into US meanings that are a little at variance with what I learned and are in my UK based dictionaries

De-planed & de-trained are US terms that give me a headache.
For me people would just leave or exit the plane or train, or disembark.

De-planed & de-trained are US terms that give me a headache.

These are industry specific terms. I assure you that they give most of us in the US headaches too.

Actually, US spelling was not well received outside of the US until the IT revolution and all the US based software using US spelling pushing everyone in that direction. It then became a case of people being too lazy to correct what the software did.

You wouldn't get away with "color" here. I try to use American spelling here (and only here) because I judge that the majority of readers are American

Surely that is political speak for "dumbing it down to stop complaints about spelling"

:0)

many companies were using US spelling because everything was done using US written software that used US spell checkers by default and it was too much trouble to go through and reset the default settings in the software every time they did a rebuild or major upgrade of the software.

ie laziness. I would have thought that if the software was sold in Australia it would automatically come with Australian (ie British) spell checks. Certainly when I was working in England that was the case here. It is easy to get any major language spellcheck etc from Microsoft and from Apple; I have two languages from each, free of charge. (I do moan that messages from Apple are in two languages - part French, part English)

For a company, depending on its setup, a centralised spellcheck (as we had) can be a one-off installation, quick and easy for the IT department.

the majority of changes suggested by Webster were rejected by the U.S. public

That is an interesting assertion, and one I haven't seen before. Are you referring to his blue-backed speller, or his later dictionary efforts? I would be grateful if you could point me to a source for that.

That's why they've been accepted by most other countries as well.

Again, where does that come from? I think it is only the most recent generation or two (who can't spell anyway) that are beginning to "accept" US spelling outside North America, mainly because they don't care, and its easier to let the machine be right.

Slightly off topic, but possibly a factor.

In the 1960s the education profession started to introduce ita in UK schools. It is generally accepted it was a disaster since it relied on the children being (supposedly) taught to spell properly in middle school, and was eventually abandoned but it meant that those taught at home prior to entering school were told their (correct) English was wrong.

Thus many of those leaving school from the early 80s were functionally illiterate in the English language and never learnt spelling, punctuation, grammar or even capital letters.

It apparently happened in the US and Oz as well, though I have no idea how extensive it was, but may explain the rash of illiteracy from the 1990s onwards.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/1523708.stm

The article includes a letter which comments on dialect, but I know for certain that spelling was different for various regions due to local dialect and accents.

The article includes a letter which comments on dialect, but I know for certain that spelling was different for various regions due to local dialect and accents.

Certainly within the UK there are regional uses of words and I was amazed to see an American writer use a regional UK word outside a UK context. An example is to steep, to mash, to make, to brew, to soak all describing how you prepare (liquid)tea in the UK (the author referred to above used "steep" in context.

As for that strange method of teaching writing it was one of many; my daughter learned with one using the 26 letters but different pronunciations of a letter used different colours. I put the problem down to four major factors:
1 Badly educated teachers who mark correct spelling as wrong
2 Laziness on the part of teachers and pupils
3 Poor discipline - teachers cannot enforce correct spelling and some parents get violent and/or legal if their child is marked down for bad spelling because "it doesn't matter"
4 Public examiners (GCSE / GCE equivalent to GED etc)cannot normally reduce marks for bad spelling or bad grammer. There was a big row when some examiners would not accept texting speak.

It is probably unfair in most cases to blame badly educated teachers, as it is the administrators who decide the curriculum, but having said that I do accept that teaching is often a career selected when a person can't do anything else (I come from a family of teachers and have been married to a couple of them).
The GCSE standards are a different matter. What I did for O level in the sixties is now at degree knowledge in some subjects, but once you exceed 50% going to higher education you are giving academic qualifications to those below average (the US rate is about 66%) and have to dramatically lower standards and devalue degrees and some will become teachers.
Unless academic standards are applied to students going to university, educational levels will continue to decline.

It is probably unfair in most cases to blame badly educated teachers, as it is the administrators who decide the curriculum, but having said that I do accept that teaching is often a career selected when a person can't do anything else (I come from a family of teachers and have been married to a couple of them).

The GCSE standards are a different matter. What I did for O level in the sixties is now at degree knowledge in some subjects, but once you exceed 50% going to higher education you are giving academic qualifications to those below average (the US rate is about 66%) and have to dramatically lower standards and devalue degrees and some will become teachers.

Since you did O level then of course you have a decent ability. What I was referring to was teachers who probably did GCSE who themselves cannot spell well and therefore can't teach spelling or correct bad spelling.

For non Brits O level was taken (in my school) at age 14 or 15 and five passes would get you a decent lower level job. Two years after that you did "A" or Advanced level which was slightly tougher. I heard one estimate that it was the same standard as after one and a half years at Yale but who knows?

A year after that was S (scholarship) level which was required by the better universities - a friend got six S level passes and still didn't get into Oxbridge.

We also had the situation that you could take one subject or ten - you got passes per subject (and the system was crazy - I got three O level passes in various types of mathematics!)

Anyone who's really into tea, even iced tea and sun tea, knows and uses the word steep to refer to the relevant part of the preparation of the tea.

No! The five examples I gave are all in current regional use in GB for that same operation. I have to assume the word steep was imported down under but is it used equally in Cairns, Sydney, Melbourne, Perth and Alice Springs?

Where I was brought up we had a spoken dialect far far different from Oxbridge English. For example the word pronounced close to euwel is very close to the old French öil and has almost the same meaning

Where I simply pointed out that anyone really into making tea will use the correct term of steep in regards to that part of the process. I know a lot of people (especially from the UK) refer to making tea as brewing tea. I also know that brew and steep can often be used in place of each other and have applications far outside of making tea, especially in the chemical and pharmaceutical and alcohol making industries.

You are using the technical terms whilst I was using the colloquial language used (in one case by a badly educated poor widow in a 2 up, 2 down by the side of the Lagan which at that time was an open sewer). The terms I used are more "go and mash the tea please" meaning the entire process from drawing the water to pouring the finished product. SWMBO has reminded me of a sixth regional (and also Commonwealth) word - "stew" which has the other meaning of an overcooked bitter tea based concoction

It apparently happened in the US and Oz as well, though I have no idea how extensive it was, but may explain the rash of illiteracy from the 1990s onwards.

It couldn't have lasted long in the US. I was born in 1969, and I have never heard of ita.

One thing I found interesting from the article was the comment that some people feel texting spelling is an expression of a need to simplify the English language.

I found that interesting as well.
Isn't that the purpose of non scientific academia - to distort everything to meet the agenda of the person wishing to push their pet belief?
It does also cover up the ignorance of when to correctly use words like insure/ensure, affect/effect or dependent/dependant (which interestingly was flagged by the spelling software on SOL) so it makes me wonder if poor spelling is idiot driven or technology restricted.

which interestingly was flagged by the spelling software on SOL

I rather doubt that SOL has any specific spell checking. Most likely your browser has a spell checker built in that gets invoked when you are typing in a text box.

And there I was giving you credit for another bit of unsung and barely noticed benefit (in most cases). :0)
Thank you for the correction. I will see if I can educate my browser to understand English.
Also thank you for everything you do here, which is much appreciated even if it isn't always openly expressed.

dictionaries ... which accepted both UK and US spellings as valid

Many online dictionaries acknowledge spelling variants, and note where each variant is used, or whether the spelling/word is archaic for a given region/geography. I find these very useful when proofing, especially when an author is aiming for an international audience, or not.

A good recent example was an author that used 'waked' instead of 'woke'. Although 'waked' is used in some parts of the US, it is archaic elsewhere. See :

http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/wake

The author insisted it was correct, so I guess he was aiming for a strictly US audience.

A good recent example was an author that used 'waked' instead of 'woke'.

OK, "waked" is another to go in my list of non words.
Woke, Awoke, Awoken ok, but Waked?
I'll pass thanks.

list of non words

Yes, for me too, which is why it clanged in the first place.

But us proofers need to be careful. If they are aiming at an international audience, an author should not use it in unspoken narrative, but it could well be just fine in speech, depending on where the speaker learned their English.

It's also great fun proofing dialect speak, where an author wants to convey a speech pattern from, say, the deep south of the US.

It can be a real challenge to know the veracity of the words/terms/abbreviations valid in a particular place, and then to make sure they are consistently presented, especially in a looong work.

Could "waked" be a description for how someone (not the main guest) feels the day after an Irish funeral?

Could "waked" be a description for how someone (not the main guest) feels the day after an Irish funeral?

I had the same thought. :D

Waked is what whoever spilled the whiskey on him did to Finnigan.

but it's still incorrect

Incorrect for whom is the question. In some places it is correct. It is spoken, and it is written, and it is in the dictionary. Noah again ... ?

In some places it is correct. It is spoken, and it is written,

I personally don't consider things used in ignorance to be correct.
Over time they many become accepted, but it would take a very long time for them to be considered correct IMHO.

I personally don't consider things used in ignorance to be correct.

Me either, but that's not what I was saying.

I try to use solid references, and because 'waked' appears as a valid current word in the Oxford Dictionary, in the context that it is used in, then that is good enough for me.

That doesn't mean I would use it, and it doesn't mean that it should be used for an international audience, but surely it does mean that it can be used where it is appropriate.

I don't think someone would dive onto a lake or into a pavement, so it certainly isn't a redundancy and both remain valid.

There again the software writers are, I assume, more trained in computer science than english so they are a dubious source as a reference point in many cases. I know some are articulate, but by no means the majority of those I have met. I think relying on software is like relying on Wikipedia. too many inaccuracies to have credibility, but used often enough and loudly enough to kill off informed opposition.

I think relying on software is like relying on Wikipedia. too many inaccuracies to have credibility, but used often enough and loudly enough to kill off informed opposition.

I don't know what grammar check people use but those I use always give the option to "ignore". I suspect it is a case of either a) laziness of the writer to consider the computer's query or b) the writer's poor education

"into" and "onto"

Generally, in that context, into is move to within an defined space or volume, and onto is move to the surface of an object, so you can dive into a train by moving through a door or other opening, and onto a train by hanging on to the outside.

And BTW, he dived into the moving train :-)

into is move to within an defined space or volume, and onto is move to the surface of an object

But you crash a car into a tree, not onto a tree...
though it could be perceived as moving within a defined space to crash, rather than to impact the surface of the tree, though it would be a tortuous argument.

But you crash a car into a tree

Relatively speaking, the tree crashes into the car. It certainly moves into what was the volume occupied by the car :-)

But I think the generic term 'crashing into' that is used for many instances probably overrides the more correct 'crashing against' that is better used for essentially immovable objects. The waves, after all, tend to crash against the rocks, rather than into them.

I think the generic term 'crashing into' that is used for many instances probably overrides the more correct 'crashing against'

Agreed, and that explanation helped clear the point in my mind as well. Thank You!
While thinking about it I also considered the difference between crashing into a planet and crashing onto one. The second - to my mind - implies an intended destination rather than an arbirary one, but that may just be my own mind creating context rather than proper useage.

Crashing into a planet = there you are tooling along not really paying attention and suddenly find you have collided with a planet.

Crashing onto a planet = you are trying to land on a planet and miscalculate the final vectors (and the old adage about any landing you can walk away from comes into play).

But none of that has any barring on the differences between into and in to, or onto and on to.

Waked is a part of the normal regularization of irregular verbs that's been going on for centuries and will continue for more centuries ...

Interesting then that 'waked' is listed as the archaic form.

I know of at least one example that's gone the other way. I don't remember, off hand, whether it's dove-dived, or drug-dragged, maybe this is another.

drug-dragged

'Drug' as a past tense or past participle of 'drag' is a classic example.

'Drug' with this meaning does not appear in any mainstream dictionary I know of as an archaic or dialect form, except Webster's where, it is noted (only) as a US dialect form.

Again, it should never be used in writing with an international audience, and only used in speech where that dialect form is predominant.

And yet I see it all the time in writings, especially on SOL, in non-speech narrative. Sigh ...

dove-dived

Dove seems to be a US only usage according to non-US dictionaries, but Webster's equates dived and dove.

Thanks again Noah ...

'Dove' is reasonably common where I live - England - although my dictionaries claim it's mainly used in the US. It may just be old-fashioned.

That seems to place you in the South Hams.

I also found the following from a Canadian source (though Steve Chrisomalis seems to be pretty international - I think he teaches anthropology in Wayne State University - just love his site for all the 10+ letter words)

"Like a nepheliad, the skydiver dove gracefully through the clouds".

Nephelmiad; a nymph 1818 - 1821

Dove was also taught to me at school (London) in the fifties as a past tense, though I have seen it used as a present tense as well and that feels incorrect.
One use I am not sure if it is US or archaic is when 'off of' is used in place of 'off'.
e.g. Taking the cat off of the table.
Never met it in the south, but used a lot in Ohio and Michigan when I was there.

One use I am not sure if it is US or archaic is when 'off of' is used in place of 'off'.

e.g. Taking the cat off of the table.

Never met it in the south, but used a lot in Ohio and Michigan when I was there.

I have heard it and instinctively didn't like it - it felt uneducated. You have caused me to look it up:
"This complex preposition is common in American English and in some British dialects" "It is non standard : off alone should be used here" (the word off being in italics)
extracted from Readers Digest "The Right Word at the Right Time"

'South Hams' doesn't mean anything to me - please could you elucidate.
But when it comes to North Ham, we've got tons hire.

Just as Yorkshire had Ridings, Devon had Hams but West Ham is in East London (which is now New Ham North East just to confuse)and another East London is in South Africa.

North Ham; the only one I found (apart from street names) is on South Havra in the Shetlands. All very Confucious

North Ham made me think of the Fat Slags from Viz, in which case 'tons' may only mean two or three, but it seems you were much kinder in your thought process than I was.

"Ham" is a contraction of "Hamlet," a small village (and not a brand of cigars with one of the finest ever advert on UK TV).

There are both West Ham and East Ham in East London, both now part of the London Borough of Newham. Also see London Borough of Tower Hamlets.

Also see London Borough of Tower Hamlets

A Hamlet just has to be a little ham. I don't want to even think about the tower version (you need to be in the UK to know about them)

the Fat Slags from Viz

in conjuction with

brand of cigars with one of the finest ever advert on UK TV

(which has incidental music of 'Air on a
G-string') raises the terrifying spectre of the Fat Slags in G-strings, something like

'ere, Trace, this string gets right up yer crack, dunnit?

Edit: why does the board insist on breaking the music title 'Air on a G-string' above?

I read that just before breakfast - so skipped the meal and am now trying to get that picture out of my brain!
Eye bleach isn't strong enough.

OK, I got the name wrong - they're 'Tray' and 'San'.
Here's a copy of them on the beach at Skegness, mostly wearing skimpy bikinis. A point of clarity for non-UK readers - a '99' in the UK is an ice-cream cone with a Cadbury's Flake in it.

And also for non UK readers, the MOT is an annual - and very thorough - compulsory vehicle maintenance inspection.
Brakes, lights, wipers, emissions, tires, horn, steering, seatbelts etc., that makes US inspections seem like a cursory check.