The PaddlerUK magazine July 2015 issue 3 | Page 67

Sieve/strainer

I’m sure we used to call these things ‘sieves’ in
the old days, but ‘strainer’ has become the
accepted terms. In the kitchen, sieve is a fine
mesh (for sifting flower and so on) and strainer
refers to colanders and so on, for quicker,
simpler straining of, say, pasta. I suspect ‘strainer’ is
the more American term.

Send

This is a strange expression that evolved from
climbers (say climbers) and skiers (say skiers). It
sounds very weak, as though the perpetrator has
sent some sort of agent down the river and is
re-living the experience vicariously (“I sent it
down that drop”). Stupid really.

Sick

Sick is to now what ‘bad’ and ‘wicked’ were to
yesteryear. I suspect it’s US in origin, although
urban etymology is famously woolly. It’s powerful,
intemperate antonym that works vividly. If I could
get away with using the word to mean anything
other than vomit, I would.

Spraydeck/sprayskirt

We don’t wear skirts. We wear decks. A point to
English

Stopper/hole

A stopper was a stopper until some clever-clogs
came alone talking about hydraulics. Then it was
all holes – ledge hole, play hole, munching hole,
river-wide hole, retentive hole (that’s just plain
disgusting), and so on. The glossary of Mike
Jones’s Canoeing Down Everest (1976
expedition) refers to ‘holes’ and ‘stoppers’ and
even ‘hydraulic jumps’. Whether English or
American, ‘hole’ has won. I mean no one is ever
going to refer to a “play stopper” are they?

Sweet

Sweet is as weak as ‘sick’ is strong. It has overtones
of sentimentality and lacks ambition as a word. It’s
American urban English at its very worst and should
be avoided by all. For some reason it’s sometimes
uttered in a revolting faux-yankee crooning falsetto.
Thankfully the sort of person who’s about to say it
usually has it written on his hoodie as a warning so
you can avoid them on sight (that’s the ed told:)

Next month: EJ and others explain
the history and development of
freestyle terminology