Day 17.268: Exile #2’s Sunday Column #494

Exile #2 writes...

We like to do the New York Times crossword. Sometimes, we find it an advantage to have spoken British English as there will be a clue hinting at a British word such as “head in London” and we’ll know the answer is “lav” or “loo”. But much of the time it is a disadvantage. We’ll be trying to answer a clue and will have words bouncing into our mind that are not used in the US. With some regularity I find myself asking Exile #1, “do they say that here?”.

It turns out that the same question also arises for those who have moved state. On Friday, one of our bird group mentioned he had always used the word “hosey” when talking about claiming something, as in “hosey the last slice of pie”. I said I’d grown up saying “bagsy” but it turned out that neither of these were known in Maine, where you would “call dibs” instead. This was confirmed by the kids later. Although, they pointed out that, if it was the front passenger seat you were claiming, you would “call shotgun” instead. Must be on account of all the heists these teenagers are getting involved in...

So, it seems I have just been scratching the surface of US English and will now have to start collecting regionalisms too. Hopefully it will up my crossword game!