Pants Pants Revolution

Since the Nordblog’s two contributors are traveling away in Germany right now and have deprived those in the States of round-the-clock World Cup coverage, YAB has had to rely on other means to keep track of the action. There’s the ever popular GameCasts that ESPN and www.FifaWorldCup.com have provided, and those do a decent job of giving you up-to-the-minute action on a two minute delay.

Yeah, you read that right.

For first-hand accounts, I’ve had to resort to reading other columnists. The best one I’ve found is Michael Davies, a Brit who has been blogging daily for ESPN’s Page 2. His recaps of games attended are clever, and if you like soccer, he’s worth checking out. There’s just one warning I need to prescribe if anyone takes my advice.

He speaks British.

I know, I know, they call it English there, and with just cause. After all, the tongue we speak originated in Davies’ homeland, and therefore, the language deserves to keep the name. When it comes to our brand of Germanic-speak, they were talking the talk first, and if anything, we should start calling our language American and they could keep English. But you know what? We may have gotten to the playground later, but we’re bigger than England, and if we want to play in the sandbox, we can push whomever we like out, even if that other kid has a permanent seat on the UN Security Council.

Because of clichés, figures of speech, and idioms that don’t translate well over water, America’s brand of English and the Brits’ brand of English have diverged over the years, and Michael Davies’, a clever Brit himself, is a perfect example. Hell, there’s two different titles to the first Harry Potter book. Where we figured that young Potter was seeking the Sorcerer’s Stone, in England, he sought the Philosopher’s Stone. These two words mean different things in each land.

In the U.S., a philosopher is a professional thinker, who must teach to eat.
In England, a sorcerer is a hooker.*

See? Imagine the shock that British kids would have had to suffer as a means of diverging tongues. The reason we write on such an alarming development is that Davies posted a column yesterday recapping England’s 2-2 draw with those chefs to the north, Sweden. Rather than using a thumbs-up, thumbs-down, or even a star system (or God forbid, that stupid 3 X’s that Regis’ new show employs), he used a system of “PANTS.” Confused? Here’s an entry from the British “Dictionary of Slang.”

Noun/Adj. Nonsense, rubbish, bad. From the standard British English of pants, meaning underwear; also a variation on 'knickers'. E.g."The first half was pants but I stayed until the end and it was actually a great film."

Ohhh…so pants are bad...who knew?

I don’t think that Tony Blair and Company are insisting that the people of the world should live their lives bottom-less, but this curious measure of slang does deserve some cross-Atlantic application. You can limit this investigation to how Hollywood views the topic.

Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants – What you thought was a coming-of-age girl power friends flick actually was about a road trip where all things went wrong. You thought you’d avoid this movie before? Consider this; the real storyline is a 20 minute sequence where the girls watch the gas gauge go to empty, and the camera stays focused on it the entire time.

Worldwide Pants, Inc. – Yes, this is David Letterman’s production company. Yes, it sponsors Danica Patrick’s racing team. Yes, it describes Paul Shaffer as a sidekick.

SpongeBob SquarePants – Insert your own joke here.

* We can’t confirm this. We’ve never been to England. But then again, “hooker” may mean something else over there too and we may be right. Eh, screw it.