Why do you call the letter Z zee?
Why do you call the letter Z zee?
SOCCER - "The brutal game once known in England as 'kicking the bladder' actually dates back at least to the Roman conquest in A.D. 43. The name 'fut balle' was given the game in the 12th century, when it was first played on a large 'field' with boundary lines, with approximately 50 men on each side. It was already causing so many injuries that a number of English monarchs, including Henry VIII and Elizabeth I, tried to ban it. The modern spelling 'football' appeared in England by 1650. Football didn't become respectable until James I of England lifted the ban imposed by Elizabeth I, and the rules against mayhem slowly began to evolve.The English game was, of course, developing into what we Americans now call 'soccer' (1889, a clipping and alliteration of 'association football') but which the rest of the world still calls, by some variant or translation of English, 'football'." From "Speaking Freely: A Guided Tour of American English from Plymouth Rock to Silicon Valley" by Stuart Berg Flexner and Anne H. Soukhanov (Oxford University Press, New York, 1997).
While we're on the topic of American "English".... "A-lume-e-num" just sounds weird.
Also, since the Internet is largely US dominated and I have spent many formative years on it, you guys have royally fvcked up my spelling.