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"Straight the way" - grammatically correct?

45 replies

Aniles · 10/08/2005 09:38

Ok, now this is a really boring, unimportant question but it's bugged me for a long time. Saying this in a sentence eg 'go to the shop straight the way' (rather than straight away) always sounds wrong to me but I hear so many people say this so often, including teachers and people who speak very eloquently that I'm starting to think it must be grammatically correct, but I can't understand why it sounds wrong to me. I know this is a really daft question so don't want to embarrass myself by asking someone I know, and I'm absolutely sure that if anyone can tell me the answer, it's a mner.
So, is 'straight the way' grammatically correct or not?

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Marina · 10/08/2005 09:42

Not grammatically "correct" but seemingly the norm for the part of the UK where you live Aniles. There are all sorts of little quirks of grammar still alive and flourishing in various regions...

binkie · 10/08/2005 09:43

are you in Scotland? Just sounds regional to me - so wouldn't be "right" in something formal & written, but absolutely fine spoken

alexsmum · 10/08/2005 09:43

never heard it before! how mad? where do you live?

Marina · 10/08/2005 09:44

I wondered Scotland too, binkie.
I love the way spoken English is still so fluid, I think it is its huge strength as a language.

Ameriscot2005 · 10/08/2005 09:45

I'm Scottish and have never heard this before.

binkie · 10/08/2005 09:50

Really, AmScot? I'm Scottish - Edinburgh - and when I read the phrase it's like hearing my friends' mums.

Similar to "needs washed" instead of "needs washing", which I still say.

Aniles · 10/08/2005 09:51

I'm in the East Midlands

OP posts:

Ameriscot2005 · 10/08/2005 09:53

I'm from Edinburgh too. I agree with you about the 'needs washed' thing, but I have never heard 'straight the way'.

alexsmum · 10/08/2005 09:54

it's weird the way language is so different regionally, i remember having the builders in while at uni and this builder telling that he was working 'while 11 o'clock and then having snap while 12'...had no idea what he was going on a bout!!!( working until 11 and having lunch till 12)

alexsmum · 10/08/2005 09:56

another example- where i live now everyone calls their pram their 'trolley'. when ds was first born and a friend asked if i was bringing my trolley out with us i thought she meant like a shopping trolley!

Mum2girls · 10/08/2005 10:00

I'm W.Midlands - and I've never heard it.

binkie · 10/08/2005 10:00

AmScot, perhaps it's fallen out of use since? - I am getting on a bit, so what I remember of my friends' mums from childhood is a long time ago. We still had fishwives with baskets on their backs who came to the foot of the close.

Ameriscot2005 · 10/08/2005 10:03

Fishwives? I remember those! The only thing leftover from that era are their voices!

Where in Edinburgh are you? I'm from Musselburgh and fishing used to be a big thing there.

binkie · 10/08/2005 10:07

The fishwives were in the New Town; then Newington. Ran away in 1980.

Musselburgh ... ds and dd were with g'parents last week and had a pilgrimage to Luca's.

Ameriscot2005 · 10/08/2005 10:15

I went to school in Newington - had a few teachers that could have passed for fishwives.

Luca's - haven't had it for years and years. Is it still as good as it used to be?

binkie · 10/08/2005 10:23

not down by what's now Cameron Toll? that was my first school and I can still smell the mince

well, ds and dd did go on and on about their ice-creams. I wasn't there though and would love to know. Perhaps you could do an altruistic experiment for me?

Marina · 10/08/2005 10:28

Ah, Cameron Toll! We have good friends in Newington, walkable from CT - I think I know where you must have gone to school Binkie.

Ameriscot2005 · 10/08/2005 10:29

Not far from Cameron Toll - the other end of Lady Road.

Ameriscot2005 · 10/08/2005 10:30

I'm not there anymore, Binkie, so the ice cream will have to wait! I don't think they do mail order

binkie · 10/08/2005 10:32

This is quite fun ... was it just the junior bit, of a ladies school whose senior bit was elsewhere?

nailpolish · 10/08/2005 10:32

you talking of edinburgh is making me all misty eyed

i used to live in easter road, then old dalkeith road then porty - lucas is fab!

oh how i miss the 'burg

nailpolish · 10/08/2005 10:34

ameriscot, i have seen lucas ice cream for sale somewhere, dont know where, might have been a sainsburys somewhere,

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mawbroon · 10/08/2005 10:36

Hi there. I lived 14 years in edinburgh (many of them in Gorgie) until outrageous house prices made me decide to move to West Lothian. And actually, it's not that bad out here!!

And I have never heard "straight the way" i'm afraid.

Ameriscot2005 · 10/08/2005 10:36

Junior and Senior ladies on the same site.

Fortiter vivamus and all that...

nailpolish · 10/08/2005 10:40

mawbroon, i think "straight the way" is west lothian/central more than edinburgh

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