|
|
Joined: Jan 2004
Posts: 79
journeyman
|
journeyman
Joined: Jan 2004
Posts: 79 |
Ireland:
tidy up (intransitive)
tidy the room/house
"Tidy up the room" is possible, but sounds somehow effeminate(?) - I can't put my finger on it exactly.
I wouldn't understand "pick up the room" - the only way I could parse it was in terms of booking a hotel room, as in "I picked up the room for a bargain price".
|
|
|
|
|
Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 5,400
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 5,400 |
I wouldn't understand "pick up the room" - the only way I could parse it was in terms of booking a hotel room, as in "I picked up the room for a bargain price".
yeah, but... my mother quickly learned american idioms, and spoke like a native (with a bit of a brogue!) i certainly was told 'pick up (the living room) or (dining room)' as a child growing up.
(and was told my own room looked like
the wreck of the hesperus
a den of iniquity
worse than the black hole of calcutta
terms that had many of my friends scratching their heads..)
actually most of them were meaningless to me until i looked them up.. In the 70's, i picked up a copy of Turners Wreck of the Hesperus--what a beauty.. (it was a mental reframe too.. one 'set of harsh critial words' that had been branded into my brain, became a thing of beauty.. should anyone today say i looked like the wreck of the hesperus, i would say, "Thank You!"
american have their own idioms.. but many are quickly learned.. (we don't get our knickers in a twist... but sometimes our panties get in a bind!)--
|
|
|
|
|
Joined: Apr 2002
Posts: 475
addict
|
|
addict
Joined: Apr 2002
Posts: 475 |
I don't remember ever being made to tidy my room as a kid so I can't contribute any local expressions. Housework always involved the other rooms in the house. When the place needed blitzing, my mum had a very effective method, she would get out four (one for each of us) binbags and say, 'if there is anything of yours not in your room in half an hour, it's going in the bin'. We had a game for communal mess, a parent would yell, 'cup hunt', and we would tear round the house finding all the cups and saucers left under beds and the like-- the one with the most items of crockery won. Probably well dangerous, but fun.
|
|
|
|
|
Joined: Jun 2002
Posts: 7,210
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jun 2002
Posts: 7,210 |
binbagthat's a new one for me... 
formerly known as etaoin...
|
|
|
|
|
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858 |
We used to have some large spherical sacks half full of
"bins" that kids sprawled on watching TV.
|
|
|
|
|
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858 |
"Clean your bedroom. All of it. "
A rhetorical device mothers find necessary.
The addition of a concluding sentence that merely emphasizes what has already been stated. A kind of amplification.
|
|
|
|
|
Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
OP
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296 |
I've certainly heard 'clean your room,' 'straighten up your room,' and, of course, 'pick up your room' over the years.
'Tidy up' or 'tidy' both sound foreign to my ear, as did 'ready the room.'
'Blitz' sounds modern--and full of energy! But I've never heard it used around here till today.
I like the 'all of it!' because kids are prone to 'halfway do a job,' which, in adult measurement, isn't even halfway.
But what works best for me mentally is to think of 'setting' or 'getting' a room in order, a bigger challenge than most here might imagine.
|
|
|
|
|
Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 3,065
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 3,065 |
dodyskin: binbag
eta: that's a new one for me...
So, what do you call bin bags then (black plastic bags to line dustbins/trashcans)?
Bingley
Bingley
|
|
|
|
|
Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
OP
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296 |
In reply to:
So, what do you call bin bags then (black plastic bags to line dustbins/trashcans)?
plastic trashbags
plastic liners for the trashcan
trashcan liners
50-gallon liners
...and so on. But never binbags! Ha! Binbags (I must not hyphenate because:) sounds so funny! It is a very comical-sounding name. If I were a writer for TV, I would definitely work binbag a lot into my scripts just for the sound of it! Now 'plastic liners'? No humor; no fun. Just functional. Blah!
|
|
|
|
|
Joined: Aug 2002
Posts: 2,154
Pooh-Bah
|
|
Pooh-Bah
Joined: Aug 2002
Posts: 2,154 |
While staying with a teacher friend in London I helped supervise a group outing of 6 year olds. One threw an apple core on the ground after lunch and when I told her not to litter she picked it up and tried to give it to me.
"Here, Miss"
"I don't want it. Chuck it in the garbage."
"What, Miss?" very puzzled look at the foreigner.
"Put it in the garbage can."
"Where, Miss?"
"In the . . ." desparate attempt to speak English instead of Canadian "In the . . . trash bin?"
"Oh, all-right Miss"
|
|
|
|
Forums16
Topics13,915
Posts229,917
Members9,197
| |
Most Online3,341
Dec 9th, 2011
|
|
|
0 members (),
795
guests, and
3
robots. |
|
Key:
Admin,
Global Mod,
Mod
|
|
|
|
