Weather....

[J-G]

I can remember in the 40s and 50s that 5 shillings were known as a dollar, and a half-crown was 'alf a dollar! A pound was a quid, and I asked my Mum why Mary didn't have a quid for a bed in the carol. ("No crib for a bed")

That is one thing about the Decimalization of the Currency that annoys me - the loss of (most of) the colloquial terms. There are still referencies to a 'Quid' of course but no longer any 'Bob', 'Tanner' or 'Joey', and although we still have coins with the value of both a Florin & a Double Florin very few would understand what they meant in conversation.

 

[Dave Moore]

I worked in Canada in 75 with a load of Americans. When asked how long I had been there, I replied a fortnight. Reply was what’s a fortnight? I said well I guess it’s fourteen nights. They didnt use that term then in the USA , no idea if they do now.
Regards,
Dave

 

[D_W]

I worked in Canada in 75 with a load of Americans. When asked how long I had been there, I replied a fortnight. Reply was what’s a fortnight? I said well I guess it’s fourteen nights. They didnt use that term then in the USA , no idea if they do now.
Regards,
Dave

no. It would be said as "two weeks" or "about two weeks" here.

 

[D_W]

I've just asked my Niece who has lived in CA for the past 20 years and has two youngsters who have some LEGO and (without any prompting from me) confirms that she has never heard the term Legos.

Well, that confirms nobody in the US uses it. Since it's a common gift here, I heard it from at least 5 separate people yesterday. I didn't correct any of them because we consider people who do that as either dissatisfied or with not much more to offer than being overly proper. That's not a shot at anyone, that's literally the thing in the US. If you correct people while they're talking or after and they know that you are aware of what they mean, they will quickly move you to their mental allocation of people to avoid.

In German, we were quickly taught that generally when you speak to someone from Germany, they will say "good job" or congratulate you for trying to speak german but generally mumble the correct way to say things while you're saying them. Why were we taught that? Because it's considered to be very inconsiderate in the states, and it's good to know ahead of time that the person doing it isn't trying to one up you, but rather it's their cultural norm and they're trying to be helpful.

See NPR and New Yorker articles, which are not lightly edited - whether someone in CA has heard legos or not, it's common use here. Common enough to be listed in online usage guides. I can guarantee you that for the thousands of times I've heard, it i've never even heard a German student here in the exchange correct anyone for it and stopping a conversation to even do that would not be perceived well.

 

[Terry - Somerset]

The name 'LEGO' is an abbreviation of the two Danish words “leg godt”, meaning “play well”.

The US attachments to "legos" seems odd to a Brit where the expression "play wells" is bizarre.

Language use evolves. Just consider the unremarkable words we may have happily used 40 years ago which we now avoid - queer, gay, spastic etc. New words are added - “Goblin mode” has been chosen by the public as the 2022 Oxford word of the year.

Conversely it is now entirely acceptable to use words today which 40 years ago would be considered grossly offensive, and certainly not for broadcast (no point in typing them - swear filter would immediately delete them)

If the US wants to refer to a pile of plastic toy bricks as "legos" they are at liberty to do so. As a Brit it may reinforce my (unfair) opinion they are educationally lacking. They are no doubt similarly contemptuous of other Brit norms.

 

[John Brown]

You just said it wasn't a noun, a few posts back!

 

[John Brown]

I doubt that John is being 100% honest of "oh, it was all in fun" because he's been trying to dive in to things in the last few weeks that don't involve him.

The "Legos" thing was light-hearted. The other times I feel the need to get involved are when you dismiss other people's views, and decry their work as some sort of justification for your put-downs. I should have learnt by now that it doesn't make any difference.
I have been happy to try to help on the subject of your transformer needs, but even then, you write stuff like "whatever that means" or equivalent, as if knowing techy stuff is beneath you, when you could Google the term in a few seconds.

 

[selectortone]

What does it say on the box in the USA? Lego or Legos?

 

[John Brown]

Fairly certain it'll say "LEGO".
It's true though, I think, that most Americans say "Legos". Even my niece, who has more degrees than a hot thermometer, and is an order of magnitude smarter than anyone else I've met, said it on Sunday on our transatlantic family Zoom call.
I must make a mental note never to mention it.