I tried using a greenscreen in my last video post and got rumbled very quickly. Ha! But undeterred, I thought I’d have a stab at another video post today, with a lot of help from the Fleischer studios.
Dec 062010
Nov 212010
Something I find very bothersome about having one road that goes over the top of another is what winds up happening underneath. It can result in threatening dark places at night, especially in the centre of a city where folks can buy guns at their local Walmart. I was entranced by the transformation achieved with some LED lights at this underpass near my home.
Nov 122010
Speaking of refrigerators (I’m hoping Jessica will keep coming back, because I loved her response), I enjoyed some of the words and expressions in this AmE ad from the 50s. Have a listen. Are there any you especially like too?
American readers, please help me out and correct me if I’ve got stuff wrong here. I think ‘Jeepers’ is long gone from AmE (along with others like ‘swell’ and ‘holy mackerel’ – shame, eh?) And probably ‘Boy, oh boy’ too, though I’m less sure about that.
‘Gee’ is interesting. I’ve heard it occasionally, so I think that while it’s less popular it’s still lurking. An expression that isn’t in the video that I’ve definitely heard is ‘Yes, indeedy’. I don’t know if it’s a Philly thing and I don’t hear it that often, but when I do, it always makes me grin. It packs such enthusiasm. Which brings me to something else that struck me in this video: the use of the word ‘sure’.
That sure is.
Sure, Pop.
We sure can.
I think these would all work today so I’m guessing these ‘sure’ uses seem to have endured the test of time in AmE. So what’s the implicature ? In semantic terms, sure‘s meaning is tied up with certainty, but in pragmatic terms, isn’t it more about enthusiasm or willingness? I ask because I think it might be a good example of the limited meaning we might be teaching if we choose to focus on semantics alone.
Nov 102010
Speaking of FUN, I’d like to say a few words about American fridges. Firstly, of course, folks don’t call them that here. I once called up Sears and found myself talking to an automated answering machine. ‘Which department do you want?’ ‘Fridges’ ‘We do not recognize that request.’ ‘Rrefrrrrigerratorrrrs.’ I got straight through.
Fridges are dinky things. I never thought so at the time I had one, but I know that now I live with a refrigerator. Should I ever want to, I can climb in, chill and stretch out. And what’s curious is that when we return with the shopping, just like a fridge, there still isn’t enough room.
Refrigerators are open spaces, where trespass isn’t an issue for your pals. Fridges, on the other hand, are private spaces and guests rarely enter without checking first. That hadn’t occurred to me either, until the first time an American friend strolled over, opened the door, and helped himself to a cold beer.
‘But what’s all this got to do with FUN Vicki?’, you may be asking. Well, nothing in particular, except I thought you might enjoy a minute or two of this appliances ad from the 50s. These guys seem to be having the time of their lives.
Oct 312010
One place I will NOT be visiting this Halloween night is the Eastern State Penitentiary. But I recommend you go if you can. When it was opened in 1829 it was the most expensive prison in the world and it quickly became the most famous. People like Alex de Tocqueville and Charles Dickens travelled from afar to see it. It was a Quaker institution and no expense was spared to help the inmates reflect on their sins and repent their wicked ways.
The inmates had central heating, showers and baths in their private cells. They had flush toilets – this at a time when even the prison governor didn’t have a flush toilet. They lived in complete isolation in their cells receiving their food from the guards through a small feeding hole. They had just a Bible to read, and some work like shoemaking and weaving to pass the time. I gather slowly but surely, quite a few went insane. The pressure on space meant prisoners started sharing cells in 1913, and by the time Al Capone became a one of inmates, prisoners were working together and even playing organized sports.
The place was shut down in 1971 and it’s a museum today. Each Halloween it becomes a living museum where actors don costumes and make up and take on the parts of guards and inmates. You have to sign a waiver saying something like ‘I promise not to sue you if you give me a heart attack’ and the rules are explained at the start. Basically they are ‘no touching’- so they won’t touch you and you can’t touch them, but apart from that anything goes.
It’s terrifying. You’re stumbling around the dimly lit, crumbling 11 acre site, petrified at what waits around every corner. They’ve got the timing down to an art form, so just when your heart palpitations subside they’ve dreamt up a new horror. I jumped out of my skin when an inmate roared at me. ‘Calm down, Vicki’, I thought. ‘He’s behind bars’, but the next second he’d bent the bars and his face was two inches from mine. Hitchcock couldn’t do it better.
I think it was ranked the sixth scariest place in America when we took the Halloween tour a few years ago. I dread to think what the ones deemed more scary were like.
So in our house, we have:
- a pot with a green hand that reaches out and grabs you if you try to take a sweet/candy.
- a device we hide under the doormat that shrieks when you stand on it.
- Frank – a three foot high Frankenstein monster who launches into a growl and rock song when his light sensitive eyes detect your approach.
That’s plenty for me.