It all started with a simple question: "How do you spell 'Dee'?" I had asked while trying to write the phrase three-Dee.I was updating a status report that mentioned a three-dimensional logo that fades off into the distance that is new to the system and didn't feel like writing-out "Dimensional" so used the common, vulgar, version of that phrase.
"D" was the answer I got.
"Yes." I responded. "'Dee'. Is it 'D-E' or 'D-E-E'? Word doesn’t seem to recognize either of them."
"It's just 'D' came the answer. What are you talking about?" Came the bewildered response from more than one of my British colleagues.
"The name of the letter is 'Dee'." I explained. "I just cannot remember how to spell it." I later realized that Dee, being the name of the letter D is only in Word's dictionary as the proper noun and so must be capitalized. (Capitalised to my British readers.)
A discussion ensued wherein I learned two things:
1) The names of the letters are not in "common" usage over here
- and -
2) Apparently, over here (according to one colleague) the phrase common usage means the same as "ubiquitous" does in the states.
I would not call something that is not common ubiquitous, but certainly things needn't be ubiquitous to be common! Some people (And to be fair, it is not unique to the person who did it to me at the office yesterday, I get this fairly regularly over here!) do not seem to understand that just being English, doesn't make you the end-all-be-all expert on the English language!
There is, in fact a whole wide world full of lots of other countries on the other side of the water that surrounds you who speak English. None of them speak it exactly as you do within your borders. Just because something isn't exactly the way you think it should be, doesn't mean you can immediately dismiss it as "American" which you seem to use as an synonym for "Wrong"!
Believe it or don’t! Just because you don't know something, doesn't mean it's wrong! Just because you've neve heard something doesn't mean it is not in "Common Usage."
Now, I know you're probably thinking to yourself right now: "Hey! Don, isn't that the pot calling the grass dope?" And you have a valid point. I can be stubborn and argumentative at times. At times, I am also wrong. But I admit it when I am and I admit it more often than I am given credit for.
Just this afternoon in some slack time at the office, I admitted that I was wrong when, working the daily communal crossword puzzle. The clue given was "was sleepy". The available spaces were " _ _ _ _ S _ D " when "drowsed" was offered as a suggestion, I pooh-poohed it saying that we needed an adjective not a verb. I had never heard of "drowse" being used as an adjective. I have heard of it only as a verb.
"I was tired so I drowsed on the sofa until the cab came." My familiarity is that the adjective associated with that verb is "drowsy." As in: "I was drowsy so I decided to take a room at the Bates Motel rather than drive any further that night."
When "drowsed" fit in the puzzle and no other word I could think of would, I admitted I was wrong. I said that this was a usage of the word with which I was previously unavailable.
Wherever you are today, I hope that you have the ability to admit whatever mistakes you make and I hope that you further have the patience to deal with those who refuse to. (I wish I had this ability more often!)
Don Bergquist - 26 January 2007 - Thames Ditton, Surrey, UK
1 comment:
Editor's Note:
I polled ten people later-on (a few at the office after, a few more at the pub), five had heard that the letters had names. Five knew it, one guessed it was what I wanted to hear based on my question. All of the five who knew that the letters had names could spell the ones I asked about:
Bee, Dee, Eff, Ess, Tee and Zed (Zee to those of us in the states.)
Of the five answering in the affirmative, two were British, one was South African, one was Australian, one was French, one was German. The one who guessed what I wanted to hear, could spell the names of the letters but again, was working it out. All but one of the people who answered in the negative were British. The one who wasn't was American.
I'd say that seems pretty common.
Editor
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