British vs American English (Part 1)

Most of you know that I served my mission in the great two countries of England and Wales (mostly England for my mission). My first month or so there I could barely understand what people were saying. Not only was the accent strong, but the vocabulary used over there is a lot different than ours. Sure they call it English that they speak, but so do we here in America. Thus we have the terms "British" and "American" English. By the end of my mission I had (and still am) convinced that they are two different languages. From that, I have decided that I am bilingual since I can comfortably understand both. I was thinking about it for the last little bit, and thought I would share some of the words and phrases from "across the pond" that you might find interesting. To all my friends from England or that served over there with me, feel free to comment and add some more if you like (or correct me if I mistranslated). I put "Part 1" on the title, because there are so many here, that I won't do them all in one post. I'll do another in a while. Also, these are just the translations as I understand them. I'm sure in different parts of the country they may have other meanings.

*In No Particular Order*

DODGE - "Not to be trusted". This is probably my favorite I picked up there. We'd usually say it if there was "dodgy doctrine" which would mean it was deep. Also we'd say things were "dodgy" if someone was immodest or say/do something....unclean.
FAG - Nope, it's not an insult. This actually is what they call a cigarette. So if you called someone a fag there, I'm not sure how offended they'd be.
TA/CHEERS - Either of those means "Thank You".
TAKING THE PISS/MICK - Generally this would mean that you are making fun or teasing someone. It's usually asked as a question, "Are you taking the mick?"
BISCUIT - This actually refers to what we call a cookie. This is also used to refer to crackers.
TARA/TERRAH/TADA - I heard all sorts of variations on this one while I was in England. It was often followed by "butt" or "love". This expression means "goodbye".
BUTT/LOVE/CHICK/CHICKEN - These are actually used as terms of endearment, mostly meaning "friend". I heard this a lot when people were thanking me. "Cheers butt!"
BANGERS AND MASH - This is a dish which is mashed potatoes with sausages and a type of sauce on top.
ZED/HATCH - These are the pronunciations of the letters Z and H in the alphabet. Zed sounds just as it looks, and Hatch is like how we Americans pronounce H, but with an H sound in front of it.
SNOG - Most of you have probably heard this used in Harry Potter. It means "making out" or "serious kissing".
FORKING - If you ever meet someone from Europe, and they hold out their hand in a backwards peace sign towards you (palm facing towards them, pointer and middle finger up) it's not a good thing. This is the equivalent to someone in America giving you the middle finger and it's offensive and rude. Sometimes it's called the "Two Finger Salute".
GUTTED - This means you are really upset or disappointed about something. For example you would be 'gutted' if your football team lost a match.
CHEEKY - This would be the same as calling someone flippant. In America we might say "are you being smart with me?", in Britain it would be "you cheeky little monkey!"
YORKSHIRE PUDDING - Pretty much the best thing to eat. It's not a pudding like jello or anything like that. It's a biscuit type food that's in a cup shape. You can just put butter or honey on it to eat, but the usual (and my favorite) way to eat it is with a roast and you fill it full of gravy. YUM!
PUDDING - This word just means dessert. "After dinner we'll have pudding."

Well that's enough for today. There are a LOT more that I left out, but these were some of my favorites. There will definitely be a Part 2, and possibly a Part 3. We shall see!

Degrees and Majors

Don't you just love those moments of inspiration? I'm going to give credit to Wendy (who just commented a bunch on here recently, and thank you!) and just pure boredom at work today for making the setting right for it to happen. It's like setting the stage for evolution...dun dun dun.

Anyway, I've done a blog previously about trying to decide on a major in college, but I still hadn't made a decision. (At least that's what I think it was about) I've hopped around ideas for some time now, but I still couldn't make a solid decision. First it was Psychology with an emphasis in family work, then it was Communications focusing in Public Relations for businesses. After that I remained undecided, but had until now been seriously considering Seconday Education. I hadn't fully chosen that one yet because I couldn't figure out which subject I wanted to teach. I was thinking something in the arts (like theatre, or orchestra/band), or possibly a computer teacher. The only problem with teaching computers is it's an ever changing degree as new technology and programs come out so I'd have to deal with that.
With that, I've just been doing generals in school this semester hoping that I could figure it out. It's been kind of stressful though. I need to decide soon, but it's a life changing decision! It's intimidating to be sure. I want to be sure that I'm choosing a major that will lead to a career that I will enjoy, if at least a little bit, and that will allow me to provide for my future family.

Keeping that all in mind, I was perusing through my blogs and comments and there were a few comments throughout the blogs from people enjoying my style of writing, or said I'm a good writer. As I was reading those the thought came to mind of Journalism. I enjoy writing, and I think doing that would be a fun and rewarding career.
More props to Wendy for my next inspiration. I've done two posts here about my love of Photoshopping pictures, or just making some from scratch. (http://andrewbaham.blogspot.com/2011/01/new-look-old-hobby.html) Wendy commented on my most recent one saying they looked good and gave a link to her friend that does graphic design. The more I've been thinking about it today, the more I realize that I could try for that as well as a career.
As far as teaching goes, I think I'll take my stupor of thought as to what subject to choose as a subject to focus on. So now I'm seriously considering these two; Graphic Design and Journalism.

So what do you all think? I'd really like some feedback on this.

P.S. The request is still there to re-post my blog to your facebook pages. (Just click "share" at the top of the page) I'd love to have some more readers so the help would be much appreciated! (Bryson was the only one who reposted, thanks bro!)

Fetch!

I'm blogging at work again. Yeah yeah, shame on me.
My thanks to those who replied to my last blog post (I found it amusing that half of you decided to remain anonymous) seeing if I should keep blogging along. I've decided to continue, so here we go. (See bottom of this post for a personal request)

I just finished reading an article on the Deseret News website about a kid in Utah who started a club called the "No Cussing Club" and the ongoing debate on swearing vs. clean speech.(http://www.deseretnews.com/article/700125591/Swearing-off-swearing.html)
The article mentioned that Utahns swear less than anywhere in the country. Surprised? I'm not. Although I bet if we replaced all of our fake swear words with the real ones we'd rank up there pretty high. (flip, fetch, crap, dang, etc)
For me, I give kudos to the kid who started this club at his high school. For one, it probably took a lot of guts to do that and stand up for what he feels. Also, I'm totally with him for being against swearing and profanities.
It's been an obvious trend that the standards once held years ago in media and the public have been continuing to drop significantly. The things we see now in movies and on television wouldn't be acceptable at all 30 years ago. I think the same goes for swearing. It seems to get more prevalent as time goes on, and people seem to become more accepting of it, or turn a blind eye to it if they don't swear themselves. There are a lot of movies I've gone to see that put in tons of profanity that is unnecessary. They could all be better movies without them in my opinion.
I think we've all become desensitized to it all, and we barely give recognition to it when someone does. I heard the F-word so many times while I was in England that I'm almost the same way with it. It's sad that it doesn't affect me anymore. The only time I cringe now days is when someone takes the Lords name in vain. :S

In my blunt opinion on it; I feel swearing is the attempt of an uneducated mind to express itself clearly. It's not neccessary. I think it's really lame when people use swear words as adverbs. It's always "that's f-ing cool" or "that's an f-ing awesome guitar" etc etc. How does that even describe what you are talking about? What sort of descriptive word is that? I don't get it. Why not "that's a good looking guitar you have there..." instead? Yes, I think swearing shows a lack of intelligence/education.

I also might add that when I hear a girl swear, it's very unattractive to me.

Anyway, in conclusion, although I support the right to free speech in this country we don't seem to have "free hearing" when it comes to swearing.

What do you think?

P.S. I'm trying to get my blog out there to more readers and looking for more feedback to what I write. If any of you feel so inclined, I'd love for you to link this blog post, any other posts I've done, or just my blog in general to your facebook wall/page. That would be great! Thanks!