Mississippi River Shows Something Impossible

[Johnsfolly]

2 hours ago, tjm said:

I've long thought it funny that Americans insist on dropping the French  "u" from words like colour and honour yet insist on keeping it in gouge and gauge. We certainly have a peculiar language. 

I personally would have dropped the "u" for any words where it does not change the pronunciation. Your examples of color and honor would fall into that thought process. I wouldn't remove it from gouge since that word change it's pronunciation. I've used both gage and gauge. I'm not a fan of oesophagus either😉.

@tjm thoughts on aluminum vs aluminium 🤔😅

[Al Agnew]

On 1/14/2026 at 6:44 PM, Johnsfolly said:

I personally would have dropped the "u" for any words where it does not change the pronunciation. Your examples of color and honor would fall into that thought process. I wouldn't remove it from gouge since that word change it's pronunciation. I've used both gage and gauge. I'm not a fan of oesophagus either😉.

@tjm thoughts on aluminum vs aluminium 🤔😅

We have friends that are Australian...they immigrated to the U.S. a decade or so ago.  We once went on a trip to the Arctic with them.  They, of course, say "aluminium".  We were in an area with a bunch of polar bears, so Mary and I started calling them "poliar bears".  They asked why we pronounced it that way.  We said the same reason you pronounce "aluminium".  So they started pronouncing picturesque "picture-es-kyu".  We thought that was an Australian pronunciation, until they told us they were just imitating us.  It got to where between the four of us we were pronouncing everything weirdly.

[nomolites]

I have a friend that has given up and just refers to Al as “that lightweight metal”.

Mike

[Quillback]

How about tyre instead of tire.  And thankfully we don't call trucks lorries.

[Johnsfolly]

Just now, Quillback said:

How about tyre instead of tire.  And thankfully we don't call trucks lorries.

When we lived in Ireland, I would say that we were separated by a common language😂. Rubbish bin, nappies instead of diapers, biscuits instead of cookies, digestives instead of crackers......

[ness]

US - British:

Fries - Chips

Chips - Crisps

Cookie - biscuits

Restroom - loo

Car trunk - boot

CAr hood - bonnet

Then there's the z - s thing:

Analyze - Analyse, etc.

[ness]

7 hours ago, Johnsfolly said:

When we lived in Ireland, I would say that we were separated by a common language😂. Rubbish bin, nappies instead of diapers, biscuits instead of cookies, digestives instead of crackers......

It made me smile that instead of "Restrooms" the signs said "Toilet" over there.

[ness]

...and then there's 'shag'  

[Johnsfolly]

50 minutes ago, ness said:

...and then there's 'shag'  

Besides the sexual references there is a cormorant species in the UK that is called a shag🤔