So when the UK sleeps, we know you other MNers are out there part II

[tadjennyp]

I was looking for thumbwitch's recipe for that cake and found the old thread has disappeared so Linzer and I thought we'd resurrect it!

It's difficult to exercise outside the gym here. I start at work at 7.30, which involves a 5.30 wake up as it is! In the evenings it's too dark to be safe and too hot/humid anyway.

I'd have to coerce DH into running with me as well because a lone white woman running isn't terribly safe!

I'd say it is difficult to exercise outside here but I've already seen people out running in the snow this morning. Aside from the skiing etc, I did know one woman who like cross country skiing so much that she had her baby in a trailer and attached it to her like a dog sled. You can buy those things here quite easily!

I have just found out that there is a fitness centre opening here soon that allows people to pay as they go! Y'see, this has always been my problem - I know that I can't afford to pay an annual sub fee and that I would end up wasting large amounts of it if I did - but I don't mind the pay-as-you-go option and am actually more likely to go if I don't feel pressured to do so! (Perverse, moi? ) So a group of my mum friends from the playgroup are going to see what it's like in the New Year - they have a creche too, apparently, so no excuse!

I've never tried skiing - too much like hard work on the knees, I've always thought, and my knees are rubbish. I like iceskating though...

Dh took the dcs to the sno-park for sledging, which they really enjoyed. . I got the chance to go through some baby clothes and start working out what we really need. Sometimes peace and quiet to potter around doing stuff during the day is as good as a rest.

Good luck with the new gym thumb. Not very long now till the New Year!

I am snowed under here - both literally and figuratively. The DC were very excited to wake up to about 15 cm of snow and were out with their snow shovels at 7 am, helping DH to clear the path. I'm hoping I can send them all out to play in it this afternoon so that I can get some work done (5 pages down, 58 to go by next Monday/Tuesday), but can't see all five of them (DS has two friends coming over to play) staying out for longer than about 10 minutes.

Mine last about 20 mins in the garden with the snow. That sounds like a long document Linzer, is it interesting at least?

They didn't last for more than about 5 minutes in the end. Must make sure that I get them to bed on time at least (in 30 mins max.) so that I can get a decent amount done this evening. I can't even hand over bedtime to DH as he's in Paris today and won't be back till late.

I'm translating recipes, which would be quite interesting in moderation but after 5 pages I've started to have enough! To make matters worse, I've just discovered they want the document translated into American English, which I assume means converting all the quantities too (but will have to check tomorrow).

the dentist & his assistant were chatting about how the recipes she uses from switzerland (her dh is swiss) all come in punds, not cups & saying how odd it was. i had 4 different torture tools in my mouth at the time, or i'd have told them how much better it is to cook by weight than volume.

good luck with it linzer - if it's US english they want then yes, they'll want cups etc AND some of the food will be different names. feel free to ask any of us if not sure - it took me a while to work out what rutabagas are.

Well, I've decided that if they want the recipes translated into American English they're probably not going to want grams and ml, so am now in the process of converting everything!

One quick question for those of you in the USA - do Americans tend to use cups rather than tsp and tbsp? I remember that 8 tbsp is 1 cup (so can work out 1/2 cup, etc.) so it would be quite easy to convert tbsp to cups, but am just not sure whether I need to or not.

Have just realised that a cup is actually 16 tbsp.

They use tsps quite a lot but then usually cups in quarters, thirds etc. unless it's just one tbsp. Flour is somewhat different though as is stuff like shortening, or other baking ingredients. Bicarbonate of soda is baking soda for example. HTH!

Thanks jenny - I was wondering about tsp too. I've remembered to translate Melanzani as eggplant and to write aluminum rather than aluminium, but otherwise have changed worryingly little other than quantities, temperatures, etc.

One more question: I'd translated Schlagobers as double cream before I realised I was supposed to be using US English - is it called something different in the USA? (I have vague memories of "heavy cream".)

Heavy cream should be ok, though I don't think they are exactly the same. Double cream is much nicer in my opinion.

they use tsp, tablesp, and cups (e.g. 1/3 cup).
heavy cream is nearest thing to double cream - it tends to be ultra pasteurised though, so some recipes need jsut regular pasteurised (but not many) so may depend what it's for.

i'm surprised by how many foods are different here, and that some of them have different names depending which area of the us you're in, so feel free to keep asking. there have been times when i showed my shopping list to friends & asked them to point out anything they didn't know the names of, so that i could 'translate' before wandering aimlessly around the shop looking for the wrong thing.

oh God, I hate American recipes! And Australian are almost as bad, seem to follow the American lead of using cups for everything (except, I believe, the cup sizes are slightly different [fgs])

I infinitely prefer cooking by weight - and have a full set of metric and imperial weights to accommodate modern and old recipes - cups are a PITA!

I presume you haven't come across zucchini/courgette in the book yet? Again, have troubles with that over here (ditto aubergine/eggplant). Thank God they can spell aluminium though!

Am currently having semantics ishoos with swimming - they call front crawl 'freestyle' here, because most people who swim in freestyle races use the front crawl stroke. So the Aussies have just relabelled front crawl as freestyle without actually understanding the principle at all .
Cricket is another semantic ishoo - yesterday England were "1 for 500" - confused me until I realised they meant 500 for 1! I guess it works both ways, but tis a bit odd. Also, they write "X d Y" instead of "X b Y" for any sport results - which means they're screwed when it comes to a draw! I'll get used to it no doubt but still...

I only discovered the other week that Britain now spells sulphur as sulfur. It's the backwards dates I can't get used to, oh and tire instead of tyre.

Do they? Not anywhere I've seen - outrageous! I refuse to participate in the dumbing down of English - just like I refused to call faecal 'fecal' and foetal 'fetal'. We had a repulsive error in our labs once thanks to a doc whose writing was so bad that the porters confused the c with a t and we ended up with a faecal sample instead of a foetal blood sample - gak! And as for 'hemoglobin', necessitating another e on the end to describe the 'heme' molecule - pah! just call it haemoglobin and haem and there you go - sorted. I could go on like this for days, btw...
Althought the more annoying ones are those like oestrogen and oesophagus, which move in the American dictionary to 'e' - estrogen and esophagus - wah! And their use of epinephrine instead of adrenalin...

There, I warned you, didn't I? Sorry

It changed in the late nineties, IUPAC went with the American one of the Royal Society of Chemistry changed theirs. Pretty much the only ones that know are school teachers and school children (I was in so much disbelief I looked it up).

I like how oe words move in the American dictionary, that's classic .

so the Royal...

the Royal? Have I missed something?

I was correcting a typo, not my clearest moment but what's new

I didn't realise sulfur is British English now too - when I worked in-house, sulfur was only American English. Mind you, that was in the mid to late nineties.

Have just e-mailed the translation agency to check that I really do need to convert all the measurements. No, I haven't come across any courgettes so far thumb - that's one I'd probably remember, as it's Zucchini in German. Have realised I should probably be talking about appetizers and entrées rather than starters and main courses, though.

ooh, it's like a whole different language, isn't it!

On a tangent, I discovered over the weekend that sign language is different in different countries as well - including different English-speaking countries. What a PITA!

I found that out recently too thumb - can't remember exactly how, but I have the feeling it might have been CBeebies related.

Have just heard back from the agency; they want me to keep the metric measurements. Argh - all that time wasted! No idea who the target audience is; obviously not Americans.

Don't forget Arugula not Rocket and Cilantro not Coriander.

We use cups here as they tend to follow the US system. I find it very odd - measuring is so much easier.

On the other hand I have learnt some interesting colloqualisms. For example to "walk with" something is to bring something. Eg I'm going to walk with a cake for your party tomorrow.