Get Fuzzy by Darby Conley for October 31, 2012

Anyone out there know where I can find a Mancunian-to-English translator?

Rayannina: He says if he can’t see he might have glaucoma and should see a doctor.

Also “butty” is a sandwich.

If I ran into someone speaking like that I would assume they had a stroke.

I agree. Darby must have a Brit friend or have gone for a visit.

Line by line, in case you still just need to know:

“Bobbins” = “That’s rotten.” (Bobbins of cotton= rotten in rhyming slang.)“My friend Wipes had that… the national Health Service (doctor) figured it out.Glaucoma, do you think?Best get to your doctor and check ’em out.”

“Top one”= “Good thing.”“Do you fancy some sandwiches?”(most of us know what that means without further translation… I think. )“Sorted” = “well, that’s it, then.”Successful conclusion to the conversation.

I’m not British but I have English friends and do English cryptic crosswords, so I have to keep up!LOL

Bang on Kiddo!!

Oi! Mac made clear for me! But, I’m from the North of England, so this dialect is my lingua franca. Sounds like me mum ‘e does! She’s virtually unintelligible to anyone else, especially if she’s downed a couple, the old dear.

Umm, this is a bit like the Dick Vandyke version of cockney…

lol-brilliant!

Thank you, pacopuddy.

Not exactly the Queen’s english I would think.

Thanks to Pacopuddy and SusanSunshine for the clarity :-) Usually I struggle through MMcM’s pronouncements with varying degrees of success; thanks to you two, this is the first time I have understood exactly what he meant. How nice :-)

Well, I’m a Brit, and I understood it all apart from “Bobbins”. I’m not too hot on rhyming slang though.

Darby never ceases to amaze me!

That’s like talking to my wife.

hmm – and all this time, I thought it was those cocky Brits that spoke English . . . just sayin

They call him McM because his full name is Mac Manc McManx.

Shufti: to have a quick look. Urban Dictionary suggests it has a WWII Arabic origin – peddlers saying “look, look” to soldiers.

Apparently a shufti is a look or a reconnaissance.

Oh, dear, I’ve been hanging around way too many Brit TV forums. I understood that.

Cary Grant explained and used the rhyming slang in the movie “Mr. Lucky”. (Ahh, Cary Grant… what a fine “heap of coke”!) Imagining Mac speaking in Cary’s suave voice… even funnier!

I understood it because I watch Top Gear…

I like Mac. He’s so articulate.

Oh man…laughed for about five minutes over morning coffee…Darby is genius.

Ah, you should see how we Brits send up your American slang!

Aussies shorten everything. EX: barbie = barbeque.I don’t how sandwich becomes buttie when the origin is from the Earl of Sandwich.My GGM came from the Isle of Man; they are known as Manx. Is that where Mac is from?

Two nations divided by a common language! Bring on Mac’s Geordie cousin!

Also SusanSunshine and the shufti explainers.I used to have to serve as an interpreter for a colleague from New Jersey when she was interviewing a client from the deep, deep South.By the way, best wishes and condolences to Jerseyans and others impacted by the storm.

I suppose `sorted is assorted, as in some good, some bad, as in nice greeting but no sandwiches.

It would, actually, and that’s the crazy part.

I gathered buttie was a type of sandwich. From “Keeping Up Appearances”, the character Onslow always wanted his bacon buttie which would be a sandwich rich with bacon and butter. I’m gagging just thinking about all that fat.

Assuming Mac’s mate “Wipes” is a cat, he/she would not have had his/her medical condition diagnosed under the National Health Service. Animals in the UK are not entitled to free healthcare and can only receive treatment at a veterinary practice and provided their owners are prepared to pay the often sizeable bills that are charged.

After McM’s speech I won’t complain anymore when watching EASTENDERS.

Have a shufti …. have a gander, take a look — an expression I picked up as a kid on an Air Force base in Libya…There was a huge RAF base there too….So the neighborhood kids were both English and American….and a lot of the slang was what we thought was Arabic.

The local peddlers would shout “Shufti, shufti!”Then there was “baksheesh,” cried out by beggars and by children who wanted money for small jobs like washing the windows, and “andiamo” shouted at bus drivers, cabbies and camels…. “Hurry up!”

Later I found out the Arabs used those words because they heard them from the British military….

a corruption of the original languages… Arabic, Persian and Italian. (though I think that last may be real Italian for “Let’s go!”)Anyway, they thought they were saying something in English and we thought we were using Arabic!Kinda funny.

And maybe Mac’s pal “wipes” is human… who knows… but I agree with Oak Ridge Boys about the talking animals.I dunno whether Bucky goes to a vet or a pediatrician!

Thanks, you guys who like my hat.I hope Rodd Perry doesn’t mind my “decorating” his artwork with a little of my own for the holiday.LOL

Happy Halloween, all!

This brings me to a joke I have been harboring for 25+ years, waiting to use until this morning when my daughter asked me how to spell “adrenaline.” I asked if she wanted the English or American way to spell it, and when she said she thought English would be more fancy, I started, “E-P-I-N-E-P-H-R-I-N-E.” Yes, don’t worry, I’ll keep my day job.