NB. This garish front page doesn’t have much to do with the topic. But I like it.

The Brits absolutely love rhyming and / or alliteration. From Cockney slang to the ubiquitous “See it. Say it. Sorted.” campaign, the Brits excel in turn of phrases.

If you haven’t seen this poster in London, you have to take your sleeping mask off.                     They are E V E R Y W H E R E.

Then one night coming back from visiting a hippie collective in a “warehouse community” (as you do, in London; seriously there are warehouse communities and they are pretty fabulous), I saw the following sign:

That’s catchy, right?  I can’t help but hear it as a song:

(I know. I need to find a real job.)

Oh and by the way, the Metropolitan Police (“The Met”)and Scotland Yard are one and the same. And the country of Scotland has nothing to do with it. The first police station was on a street called Scotland Yard.  (Ahhhhh, I can hear you say. )And did you know (bet you didn’t) they were the first uniformed, paid professional police force in the world? Founded by Robert Peel in 1839 when he was Home Secretary. (He later became Prime Minister under Queen Vic.) They are called Bobbies because the guy’s first name is Robert. Get it? Robert… Bobbie? They tried calling them Peelers but that didn’t stick.

A bobby; but his name was probably Conor.

And, of course there’s good old Keep Calm and Carry On. But did you know that it wasn’t terribly used during WWII? Nope. It was barely known and entirely forgotten about until a copy of a poster was found in a bookshop in a small town in Northumberland in 2000. Then we ALL heard about it.

And heard about it and heard and heard. And heard different versions.

And more and more versions. On cups and then of course, tee shirts. Everyone, even entomologists, had their point of view:

Until finally, the self-referential:

So, the lesson learned? Brits read trash newspapers as much as any American I’ve met and can copywrite as well as the next dude.

Harry Gordon Selfridge. Ever hear of him? No, right? Well it’s his fault that Apple employees smile so damn much and that shopkeepers hover over you offering unwanted help with you having to repeat, “Really, I’m just browsing,” but thinking LEAVE ME THE FECK ALONE, MOTHER FECKERS. (Then again, maybe that’s just me.)

Because it was Harry Gordon Selfridge who didn’t simply coin the phrase, “The customer is always right” but he embodied it and threw it (up) on the world. Specifically, on London, on Oxford Street.

Before this man from Ripon, Wisconsin came along, you’d go to a store, tell the shopkeeper what you wanted and the shopkeeper would get an item that fit your description and you would either A) buy it or B) say No thanks and leave the store. End of story. There was no “browsing”, no “just looking.” In the clip below, look how this attitude plays out when the uptight Brit proprietor of the store scolds Selfridge, saying: “This is a shop, Sir, not an exhibition.”

Well, this brash and confident American basically said, Screw that, shopping should be fun! And boy did he make it fun. In 1909, he opened a store called Selfridges on the less popular (i.e. uglier) part of Oxford Street. And not just a dinky little store. He thought big and he built big. It is HUMUNGOUS and architecturally stunning.

Then in 1909

Now. Please note the whole building couldn’t fit in the photo! HUMUNGOUS.

Selfridge held nothing back for the advertising campaign for the store’s opening.  Thirty police officers were required at the grand opening to control the crowds. Rather than a chore, Selfridge wanted people to see shopping as a pleasure, even, dare we say, FUN. (Those damn Americans!)

Later that year, Selfridge convinced the first person to fly a plane across the channel, a Frenchman named Louis Bleriot, to exhibit his (rickety!) airplane on the shop floor itself,  drawing crowds of 150,000. And that was only the first of many (unusual and outrageous) educational and scientific exhibitions.

Inside the store itself, there was also (I couldn’t believe this when I first read this) a post office, a theatre booking office, a library and an information bureau. In a store! In 1909! He was mad! There were art galleries, a  “silence room” for resting (LOVE THAT), restaurants and a roof garden (yea, I know “old hat” now – but not then!). Language interpreters were provided when needed, and a trained nurse was employed to administer first aid should someone take ill or fall. So it wasn’t just the customer is always right but the customer is center stage and shall be catered to.

So I like this guy cuz he had guts. I mean balls to the wall.. Everyone said, No, you can’t do that! That’s… that’s scandalous! That is unseemly! You’ll never get away that it! And HE DID ANYWAY. I mean this dude believed in himself. Yes, he can, he’s AmeriCAN! Hahah. BUT he loved loved loved England and in the end, England loved him.

I’m gonna write more about him soon. I think he’s fascinating. In the meantime, watch the series, Mr Selfridge on PBS /itv /Netflix.

You disagree, do you? G’head. Show us something funnier. Ged.(that’s the even shorter version of “G’head”.)

I taught English in Italy for a long time. You don’t even know your language has structure until you teach it. Present tense vs present continuous, past vs present perfect blah blah blah. 

Well there’s something called a “question tag.” The idea being you think something’s a certain way but you wanna be sure. Or, you think something’s not a certain way and you want to be sure. In either case, you want to be sure — you want confirmation.

To teach the Italians the idea of confirmation, I use the example of checking in on what we’re having for dinner: if I think we’re making spaghetti tonight but I want to make sure, what do I say?

• We’re having spaghetti tonight, no?

See that little “no” at the end — that is a “question tag”. It’s called a “tag” because it’s at the end.

In the States, if I am confirming that Trump still hasn’t been impeached I say,

• The orange creature is still in the White House, right?

So in conversational language, Italians say no? at the end of the sentence and instead Americans say right?

But not the Brits. No, these are complicated people, our British friends. They are not interested in being direct, are they? They would say:

• We’re having spaghetti tonight, aren’t we?
• The orange creature is still in the White House, isn’t he?
• You are quite the wanker, aren’t you?

Now, which is “correct” English? The British way of course. Hands down. I mean, c’mon, get real. We Americans say gonna, wanna and all that stuff. We cut to the chase whenever we can! The Brits instead have more reverence for the language, innit?