Yes you translated from French for me - something I could not do and if the occasion arises I am sure you would do it for others, so not minimal at all
Except that mine are for sale, or even free to a good home, with a packet of washing powder thrown in.
I remember my little friend being told if she didn't behave herself 'the bogeyman' would take her away. Not surprising it frightened the life out of her......and me!
Oooh, I don't know if I've told you the good news. At the ripe old age of 31, which he will be by then, n° 3 is moving out next year. He's got his foot on the property ladder and is buying a flat. Two bedrooms, one for him and one for his Bandes Dessinées (picture books like Tintin and Astérix but much more developed than that; they are considered an art form and have their own yearly festival at Angoulême. The translation is comics, but they're more than that - hardback, for a start. HINT: One way of getting a youth to clean his bedroom: have a spider's nest mature behind his precious BD books. They were so cute, the tiny spiders running every which way, but he didn't see it like that. His bedroom got the cleaning of its life, and every book was removed and wiped down separately. Because his flat is a new build, the government will help him, because it's trying to keep building jobs open, with tax rebates and other such, too. We didn't get any help, thank you so much Monsieur le Président, when we bought our place, of course.
I have a son - just a little older, who I could send you, to replace the one you are losing, and he only speaks English too
When my younger granddaughter's being a bit of a tow rag I threaten to take her down the tip. Her big sister gets away with things, she's pretty adept at judo, karate and kick boxing.
I've often felt a little sad that many children whose Parents were born overseas prefer to speak English-with a deplorable Aussie accent rather than the language of their Parents or G'Parents. More so it happens when a mixed marriage has one Parent who only speaks English & doesn't have time or inclination to broaden their language skills. Many children however have the good fortune to have G'Parents living with or near to them & continue to use the Family's language of birth. They don't realise how fortunate they are to have access to more than one lingo with out learning it in school-force- fed so to speak. I wish medical folk would get their English right before taking on jobs in medical profession. Maybe more people would seek help before it was too late.
One very good friend arrived in England with his family from Jamaica when he was 2 and he developed a Brummie accent. Quite often he had no idea what his mother was talking about when she got excited as she reverted to broad patois.
Please don't think I'm criticising, but does "tow rag" have any sense? I've always imagined it as "toe rag", and that has no sense at all, unless it means a really ragged (and presumably smelly) old sock! When I was at university, there was a lad studying Spanish there at the same time as me with a totally Italian name. However, when he opened his mouth, all Bradford fell out
Not bad; mine gets up at 5 a.m. and works from 6 to 12.30 6 days a week. He then returns to his burrow and sleeps/watches films in the afternoon in semi-darkness; the only lights being the the screen and all the electrics. Have I told him it's bad for his eyes? Possibly once or twice. He never opens the shutters - solid wood with no dinky cut-outs - and can only leave the window open a couple of inches because of the configuration of the room. With all the computers, extra hard disks (he's just ordered a new one) and electrical stuff - and we still haven't unpacked Mum & Dad's compact sound system, with turntable, which was promised to him - the heat is intolerable. I'm sure that if your lad wanted to come over for a week or two, especially if a bit of French could help him at work, something could be arranged. It's HOT in the summer, with lots of tourists, and it rains a lot in other seasons; that's why it's green. In fact, our house was flooded last week, which is why I've not been around. Edit: your lad ... and his mum, too. Goes without saying.
A few very different ideas of what a 'toe rag' is, but the Oxford Dictionary says this: Mid 19th century: originally denoting a rag wrapped round the foot as a sock or, by extension, the wearer (such as a vagrant). My daughter still retains the Bradford accent from when she was living and working in Yorkshire.
My great Grandfather managed to scythe through his boot and foot whilst out in the fields. He tore a piece of material from his shirt, bound it up and carried on working. His surname was SMITH and each of the SMITHs had nicknames so as to tell them from each other. This John SMITH was known as "Toe-rag" from that moment on!
Did I think of doing something intelligent, like looking it up in the OED? Nah, thick as two short planks, me. It took Bay Horse to remind me that dictionaries exist In my defence, I will say that I bought a Shorter OED - two volumes - when I was in England clearing out the house after Dad died. That was in 2011. The boxes are still piled up in the garage, and if ever, especially after the flood last week, although it came in the other door and didn't reach them, the books in them, especially my Terry Pratchett first editions, are even slightly foxed, someone is going to get it in the neck and probably elsewhere, too
