How about a nice cup of…

I don’t like tea.

This comes as a shock for most people.  They look at me with a mixture of confusion and pity and say: “But you’re English!”

Although I do like coffee ok, I don’t drink it.  Hot chocolate is my beverage of choice, and you wouldn’t believe how much it varies as to if you get a good one or not.  Much in the same way that people can get a bad cup of coffee, a bad cup of hot chocolate is as common.  (I’m looking at you, Starbucks!  That syrupy goo isn’t even hot chocolate – it’s milkshake! :P yuck!)

The point of all this (and yes, there is an eventual point) is actually about character building.
Chances are, even though I don’t like tea, one of my characters does.  They probably find it relaxing, comforting and… that’s where I get stuck.  What does tea taste like to someone who likes it?  They probably wouldn’t describe is as having “weirdly metallic aftertaste”, which is what I think of when I think of tea.

An even more extreme example, perhaps, is shellfish.  I have a philosophy that I will try things before I say I don’t like them.  It was this philosophy that led me to once try a mussel off a friend’s plate, who was nomming them down in enjoyment and was kind enough to spare one for my curiosity.

I can honestly say that it was the worst thing I have ever eaten.

 “Plump, juicy flesh and a succulent taste of the sea is what you are looking for once they are cooked,” says one cooking site.
“Chewy, strong fishy taste, gross crunchy part, and burping the horrible flavour all night,” would be my description.
So when you write a story, keep in mind that your characters may not like all the things you like, and may like some of the things you don’t.  Chances are I’ll have a character enjoying some seafood with a nice cup of tea at some point, but if you ever cook for me, I’ll stick to the chicken, thanks.

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Local words

The point of language is to communicate an idea.  I’ve always found it interesting that the same creature came up with different sounds for different things, even to the extent that some humans can’t make the sounds that other humans do.  (For example, some languages have trouble with “th” in English.  And no one but the Danes can manage “Rødgrød med fløde”)

Why did one set of people agree that a tree is called a “tree”, but another that it’s an “arbre”?

But then to complicate things even more, there are words that only exist in local regions within languages.  One of the biggest debates between people in the UK is what this is called:

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I’d call that a batch.  A lot of people would call it a bread roll.  Some people call it a cob, others a bun, and if you go to Bradford it’s a teacake (seriously, Bradford?!)

So can you get away with local words when writing?  Maybe.  Even though I maintain it’s a batch, if I mentioned one in my story, I’d probably not call it that, because I know that anyone from outside of the Midlands would get confused. 

But maybe I could get away with “scraze”?  That’s what we call what others would call a graze.  I guess it came about as a cross between scrape and graze. 

I suppose this leads onto the question of why I want to use local words at all, and not the “proper” ones in the dictionary.

Well there are two reasons:

One is, characters don’t just use words out of the dictionary.  They have their own words for things, and probably have a few good regional ones of their own.

Two is, the dictionary isn’t language.  It’s a reference for all those words that people made up.  And some words haven’t been made up yet.

So make sure you don’t get in a mardy.  I’m off to eat a batch in the spinney!