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the cloakroom is where you hang your coatWe have that meaning in UK too, but its use as a euphemism for toilet is probably more widespread. Or dropping into the sewer (literally) it was a corruption of cloaca-room  Rod
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Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
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Sparteye, what is a walk-out?
A walk-out is a house constructed on a slope, so that at least one side of the bottom floor is at ground level. The walk-out level has the construction attibutes of a foundation floor, but is (usually) finished and is used as living space. So-called because one can walk out of the house from that floor through a door directly to the outside.
Example: my house appears to be a two-story house when viewed from the front, with the first floor (called ground floor, I think, in the UK) at ground level, having the main entrance to the house and the general public living areas of living room, dining room, kitchen and so on. But, when viewed from the back, due to the slope of the ground, the house has another, lower floor. From the back, entrance to the backyard is from the level below the first floor. That lower level/basement has a finished recreation room, a bar and a bathroom, and doors and windows to the outside. To access the first floor from the backyard, you must go up steps to a deck and then to doors which go into the sunroom or garage.
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Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
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the cloakroom is where you hang your coat
We have that meaning in UK too, but its use as a euphemism for toilet is probably more widespread.
And the Brits cracked wise about the Merkins' euphemism, bathroom.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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A walk-out! Just what our house in the woods is. The front door is around back and leads into the living room. It is at ground level but that floor is one story above the ground level in the back of the house (which is in the front as seen from the road if you can see it from the road which you can't in the summer because the trees are all leafed out and which you can't in the winter because it's snowing too hard {Sorry E}). The door at ground level in the back of the house leads into the basement. Don't usually go that way in the summer but in the winter the slope down from the front door can be treacherous so I go in and out the basement door.
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A walk-out is a house constructed on a slopeThanks for that Sparteye. We have houses built on slopes too (and sloping houses come to that) but I don't think we have a word for them. My Aunt's house is built into the side of the Malvern Hills with the kitchen wall almost just plastered rock, and you can walk out of the upstairs bedroom to the garden (which is a 1 in 4 slope!). And yes the floor at ground level is the ground floor in UK. The first floor above that is the first floor. We didn't think of naming the first floor you came to as the first floor Rod
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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" And the Brits cracked wise about the Merkins' euphemism, bathroom."
Dear Sparteye: Since when are pubic wigs capable of voicing euphemisms?
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Dr. Bill asks: Since when are pubic wigs capable of voicing euphemisms?
Oh, please Dr. Bill. It's bad enough listening to the English school boys giggling, but when one of US'ns falls into this parochial tittering it's time to speak up proudly! US'ns is Merkins by gar and plane tree! And US'ns ain' gone let no fourth rate economy say no differments!
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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tap, spigot or faucet?
Most common is faucet but tap fairly common and spigot mostly for water source outside like for watering the garden or washing the car.
the large thing in the room with all the plumbing fixures?
Toilet, sink and bathtub with shower called a bathroom. If just a basin and toilet then it's a half-bath or powder room especially if on ground floor for use by guests.
Lav to me means a lavatory which is a holdover from my convent school days ... more commonly called a Ladies Room ... toilets in cubicles and a bank of wash basins.
firemen attach their hoses to a hydrant for municipal water
protesters/rioters hauled away in Black Maria, Paddy Wagon.
what is under your house My house is slab-built which means I have no basement (old fashioned word) or cellar (more common) and tho I sometimes miss the storage a cellar offers, other times I'm glad I don't have the temptation to amass yet more "stuff!"
the water for household Hot water heater with "Quick return" ... which means my guests and I can take showers one following quickly upon another, without my having to bath in frigid aqua. Heavenly!
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Carpal Tunnel
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OP
Carpal Tunnel
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well in NYC-- and i think in some other east coast cities--Hydrants can be
Fire plugs
Fire pumps (recently saw one with this label, brooklyn side of Brooklyn Bridge)
Johnie pumps
Jonhie plugs (rare)
and fireman also connect their hoses to Stand pipes (to feed sprinkler systems)-- No one else uses these terms? or now having heard them-- can you think of some that have slipped your mind?
there is (was) a NY street game Johnie on the pony that uses a fire hydrant (never just hydrant) as an anchor for the game.
and Wow tossed out basin for a bathroom sink-- with out so much as a thought.. (and I hadn't even thought of the word till she tossed it out!)
I thought it interesting that Cloak room exist as a term for a toilet area-- and then remembered the old garde-robe-- which in time past, when england's system of drains was less refined--there were areas next to what we americans would call a closet-- (a small room for clothes) that also included an open shaft for "facilities" (a US Highway euphemism for bathroom-- "Rest Area --Facilities available" ) -- so a garde -robe morphed into a cloakroom-- which, i suspect now, as in times past is actually 2 seperate Rooms-- One for cloaks, and one with "facilities".
I tend to use tap and faucet but my parent more often used spigot-- (water came out of the spigot, after you turn the tap.. what about water spout (like the one the itsy bitsy spider goes up) or is that what I call a leader?
My house has gutter to catch the run off-- the water is then lead down and away from the house by a leader...Or is a water spout like a simple stone "gargoyle"-- an extention that direct the water away from the house-- (but lets it fall freely from the roof line?
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Carpal Tunnel
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"it's time to speak up proudly! US'ns is Merkins by gar "
With so many choices of nicknames for Americans, why not choose one less susceptible to ridicule.
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