Looking for the UK equivalent of "blown off ( Read more... )

Hello, I am in the process of writing a Harry Potter story and I am looking for a slang phrase for being played or manipulated. I am an American and I'm hoping to avoid as many americanisms as possible. My context is thus: one character is telling another character that they've been manipulated. In the US a slang phrase would be "you've been played ( Read more... )

I just had Harry say "Can the attitude?" (Meaning more explicitly "Are you saying you want me to calm down and not act that way anymore?")

And realized, you know, that's probably really American. I could replace that with:

"Drop the attitude?"

"Ditch the attitude?"

"Boot the attitude?"

or whatever else actually sounds British.

I look forward to ( Read more... )

An American way to give a positive response without speaking would be to hold up a thumb, with the other fingers all folded over. It's called "giving a thumbs up." Here it is a simple way to say 'yes.' It doesn't have a lot of cultural overlay.

Do Brits do this?

Thanks!

If Draco made me angry, I would say he had pissed me off. I might say he'd narked me off, too. I am guessing this isn't the way a Brit would say it, but I searched through the tagged entries for a while and could not find anything about this idiom. Help?

Hello oh helpful ones ( Read more... )

I realized I may have been using an Americanism and want to check. Is "real" used in spoken, informal speech for "really" (as an intensifier), as in "real cool", "real scary", etc? I used it as a sarcastic remark, meaning the opposite (that was not cool at all, not scary at all, etc). It's teenage Harry talking. If that doesn't work, should I use ( Read more... )

I'm reading the newest JK Rowling's Cormoran Strike mystery, and there's a British phrase that I just don't understand. I goggled it but had no luck.

The phrase is laying in plates,

So they weren't lying in wait for Quine?"

"No, but they could haven been laying in plates,"

Thanks in advance.

If one student was speaking to a small group of peers (e.g. Sirius to the other Marauders), would they address the group as "guys"? Like, "Hey, guys, look what I found ( Read more... )

Hello! I am a silly American who needs a hand. So, something I say a lot is "preaching to the choir." I just used it in my hp fic draft and thought "oh, wait, is that something that would make sense to a wizard?" and then I realized that I wasn't even sure if it was used outside of the US. Google is kind of wishy-washy on the subject, so I thought ( Read more... )