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[Bruno]

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'Pee' is a bit more girly. Most often we'll use 'restroom' instead of 'pee'. And swearing isn't exactly frowned upon among friends of a certain generation (my parents and their friends said 'fuck' very rarely; we say it all the time) so I'm not sure that's what's behind it.

Still, our talk is perhaps less saturated with that sort of thing than the typical UK's.

I dunno, maybe lots of people say 'piss' here and I just don't belong to that crowd. 'Taking a piss' of course doesn't mean 'taking the piss'; and when you use piss as a verb it generally seems to need a direct object. 'I have to piss' is a bit off; and 'I have to take a piss' is a bit adolescent male. Most often, the word 'piss' is used as in 'pissed' i.e. angry.

[Bruno]

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Gangster Octopus wrote:

I remember at a very young age when we lived in Dublin following a friend of my father out of the room and down the corridor, 'cos he said he "going to see a man about a dog" and I wanted to see the dog...

I thought it was a horse?

A friend of mine was fond of saying "I gotta go shake hands with the governor."

[Wyatt Earp]

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Bruno wrote:

'Taking a piss' of course doesn't mean 'taking the piss'...

Over here, in a "restroom" context, pisses are had, not taken.

[Bruno]

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And does anyone ever drain the lizard?

[Brandenburger Toro]

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Snake yes, lizard no. Unless your thingy has little legs at the side, it's a better structural analogy.

If your thingy has little legs at the side, your chosen euphemism for peeing is probably the least of your worries...

[Rogin the Armchair fan]

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Susannah Reid's audible gasp (imagine the Daily Mail in human form - perfect bouffant, and narrows her eyes and purses her lips like a cat's arsehole when a story about immigration or people on benefits is on)

Word.

I've not actually heard this awful person utter the word "ghastly" on live TV when a piece about poor people not being to afford their gas bills comes on. But her smug fixed grin betrays her real empathy with people she hopes the closest she will ever come to is to have to smile at them as they applaud her.

[Ginger Yellow]

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Serendipitously, I came across this on a mediaevalist blog in a discussion of the stupid newspaper stories about lexical replacement in the last week:

Through frequent use, "dirty" words come to be seen as, well dirty, and have to be swapped out for politer terms that haven't been so sullied. "Don't say 'toilet,' " the slightly over-sensitive 1950's American says. "Say 'bathroom'." Over their shoulder, their grandmother clucks, "What's wrong with 'toilet'? Just don't say 'privy'. Ghastly word, that." And her grandfather rolls his eyes, "We always called them 'privies' in my day. It's," he whispers, " 'khazi' that has the stink on it. Never say that." And so on and so on back to the Romans, who if the Classicists are to be believed, had the most grammatically perfect name for lavatories ever devised, but sadly the Middle Ages botched it and here we are.

[Bruno]

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But surely by the time you arrive at 'bathroom' the progression ceases. It's been permanently sanitized. Baths are inherently clean (unless you're bathing in feces of course).

[Bruno]

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In which case the bathroom would be the best place for that.

[Wyatt Earp]

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Bruno wrote:

But surely by the time you arrive at 'bathroom' the progression ceases.

Restroom? Comfort station?

You're having a laugh. You'll never stop euphemising, you crowd, it's your Puritan heritage.

[Rogin the Armchair fan]

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I think they were in Roman days. Probably delighted in it, given all their other well-documented perversions. Wasn't the Roman equivalent of personal hygiene having the crap scraped off your skin once a month by a slave?

And things only got worse by the middle ages. Nobles used to be stitched into suits that they would then wear for months, or indeed years, on end, mornnig and night, with the only concession to hygiene being flaps at front and back for, well, you know.

It's the one thing that puts me off time travel. I think I'd walk into Henry VIII's court, gag, and exclaim "FUCKING HELL! YOU TOTAL MINGERS!" and be immediately beheaded.

[Bruno]

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Wa ayat al Urbi wrote:

Bruno wrote:

But surely by the time you arrive at 'bathroom' the progression ceases.

Restroom? Comfort station?

You're having a laugh. You'll never stop euphemising, you crowd, it's your Puritan heritage.

My understanding is that the restroom used to be the room attached to the bathroom where you freshened up and whatnot. Or even rested and looked at a paper. So a pardonable, even honest substitution. It would be interesting to see the word restroom evolve into a dirty one.

Now I think about it 'bathroom' isn't said anymore except in the home, and only when it's your own home. Visitors will ask where the restroom is. Perhaps restroom is the end of the cycle, though. Comfort station is several degrees more ridiculous.

[Incandenza]

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Ginger Yellow wrote:

Serendipitously, I came across this on a mediaevalist blog in a discussion of the stupid newspaper stories about lexical replacement in the last week:

Through frequent use, "dirty" words come to be seen as, well dirty, and have to be swapped out for politer terms that haven't been so sullied. "Don't say 'toilet,' " the slightly over-sensitive 1950's American says. "Say 'bathroom'." Over their shoulder, their grandmother clucks, "What's wrong with 'toilet'? Just don't say 'privy'. Ghastly word, that." And her grandfather rolls his eyes, "We always called them 'privies' in my day. It's," he whispers, " 'khazi' that has the stink on it. Never say that." And so on and so on back to the Romans, who if the Classicists are to be believed, had the most grammatically perfect name for lavatories ever devised, but sadly the Middle Ages botched it and here we are.

I've never understood "khazi." Where does that come from?

My dad says "hit the head," but that only ever means to take a leak, not to drop your kids off at the pool.

[hobbes]

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Ask and you shall recieve:-

Khazi
Lexicographer Eric Partridge derives khazi, also spelt karzy, kharsie or carzey, from a low Cockney word carsey originating in the late 19th century and meaning a privvy. Carsey also referred to a den or brothel. It is presumably derived from the Italian casa for house, with the spelling influenced by its similar sound to khaki. Khazi is now most commonly used in the city of Liverpool in the UK, away from its cockney slang roots.

[Ginger Yellow]

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My dad says "hit the head,"

A head is a toilet on a boat.

[WOM]

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If I'm at work and need to hit the loo before a meeting or leaving in a cab for a presentation, I generally say 'I'm just going to powder my nose", which is so absurdly a) throwback and b) feminine that it tends not to offend anyone, while conveying all the info needed.

[Bruno]

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while conveying all the info needed.

You sure about that?

[Guest]

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When I was younger and more foolish I heard a colleague announce that he was leaving the office to "drop the kids off at the pool". Never having heard this euphemism for laying a cable, I took this as a curious but true statement of what he was about to do and mentioned it some days later in conversation. Luckily it was just to the editor who was a good mate of mine, so he limited his guffawing, but I still flush with embarrassment when I recall it.

[The Awesome Berbaslug!!!]

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I think Michael O'Leary practices naked in front of the mirror making offensive comments as it is the only way he can get an erection.
He is too mean to buy viagra.

hahahaha.

[David Agnew]

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Disco Sea Shanties wrote:

I think the Irish and the Aussies put us to shame when it comes to swearing.

Why do you think Easyjet is worse, Phoebe? I've never really had a problem with them.

I've only done one trip for each.

Easyjet was "London" (actually Luton) to Amsterdam. It would have been quicker to have walked. I arrived at Schiphol 20 hours late, my companion (we booked together, turned up together, checked in together, and were scheduled on the same flight) arrived six hours later. When we got home, we then found, with a little digging, that we could have got to the same airport on time, from a nearer airport (Birmingham) for £10 cheaper, through a little known travel agent selling seats on Maersk's occassional passenger flights, using BA planes. Which is what we did a fortnight later, when we went to Rotterdam.

Ryanair was Stansted to "Brussels" (actually Charleroi, more convenient for where we were going). Everything went slightly better than clockwork, as we managed to land 20 minutes early on the way back. Yes, there's sod all to do at Charleroi airport, but there's sod all to do at most train stations and bus stations. The only thing I want to do at an airport is fly. Easyjet have lots of facilities, but that's because they're needed.

Ryanair skimp on many, many things, but the one thing they don't skimp on, is departure slots. If the ATC system for London goes down (not as rare as you'd think), getting everything back together, and everything flying again goes in a certain order. BA have (or at least had) number one priority at Heathrow. The lowest prioiry airport in London is Luton. The airline with the lowest priority at Luton, is Easyjet. If the ATC system goes down for an hour, most flights will leave, albeit delayed. With Easyjet, forget about it. There was no official announcement that flights that day had all been cancelled, it just travelled by word of mouth, with a subsequent free-for-all for rebooking flights, and somewhere to stay overnight (nice hotel in Dunstable), and don't forget the cab fare back, because Easyjet won't refund you on that.

And Easyjet of course have no system in place, because if it looks like disorganised chaos, it suggests to the customers concerned that it's a fluke, a one-off, and it's just unlucky, but it happenned four times (according to little reports I saw in the papers at the time) in the month it happenned to us.

Easyjet are just Ryanair with better PR.

[Guest]

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I've never really had a problem with either of them when flying.

I think it's important to separate criticism of their business models from implied criticism of the individuals who work there. I used to work for easyJet in Luton Airport, and the people and managers there were all really nice, getting on with each other and doing their best for passengers. This idea that their workers are deliberately vindictive or sadistic towards passengers, or incompetent, is just wrong. What failures occur are largely due to overall structural issues and cost savings, including the incredibly low salary that easyJet workers earn, as well as all of the logistical issues inherent in flying.

For whatever reason, passengers react in such intense ways when things go wrong in airports, way way disproportionately more so than when things go wrong in other commercial situations.

For me, in general, Ryanair gives the impression of being cheap and nasty, personified by Michael O'Leary, whereas easyJet are the former.