"Yowie" wrote in message
...
wrote in message
...
I'd like to pause for just a moment, to have a tangential linguistic
discussion.

Singh wrote:

Just to be on the safe side, Louie rigged up the dresser so she
can't
get beneath it now. So at least if she does go down cellar, we
have
some idea of how and where to find her.

Oh, *WOW*!! I haven't heard the phrase "go down cellar" for years!
(It
means "go down to the basement", for the uninitiated.) But that's
how my
mother always said it. I just had a childhood flashback!

I'm from Boston. My parents are from Boston. All of their parents
were
born in Boston, too. So I'm thinking maybe "down cellar" is a
Boston-ism.
Or maybe a New England-ism?

I always find it weird to hear the American term "I'll write you"
rather
than saying "I'll write *to* you". I don't know when the dropped "to"
or the
"to the" in your case above first started to be thought of as correct
grammar in American English, but to these Commonweatlth English ears,
it
always sounds wrong.

But being quite ancient in terms of cuber-life, I've learnt that even
"English" has distinct sub-languages, and no one particular dialect is
any
more "correct" than any other - just that some are "older".

Ye Olde Yowieth

Just as I find it strange that British and Australians say someone is
"in hospital", rather than "in *the* hospital". English is, indeed, a
strange language, and the various ways it is spoken make it even
stranger.

Joy