Funny tangentially-relevant anecdote from a couple of years pre-GFC
about two different countries separated by a common language:

My sister was working as an alarm/security technician, and the mob she
was working for had two main offices - one in Brisbane, and another one
up in Rockhampton (a short 700 odd km (~440 miles for the Imperial-using
types) north by road from the Brisbane office).  AU roads are all over
the place (let's not get started about the drivers _on_ said roads -
I've heard (and uttered) more than one rant) - nothing up to autobahn
level, some pretty good main highways (100 or 110 km/h speed limits,
multiple lanes on each of a dual carriageway), with road quality
decreasing with distance from main drags / major cities / mines.  I have
driven on country roads with potholes you drive into and then back out of.

The mob in question were handling alarm maintenance for another
organisation, based across the really big pond.  Cue phone call from
some middle manager (or "unrecoverable dropkick", to quote sis mid-rant
to me later) asking her to just head down the road and "take a look real
quick" at some malfunctioning alarm board.

She looked up the details for the board in question, and had to mute the
phone while she fell apart laughing - loudly enough that the Rocky
office manager stuck her head in and asked if a seizure or the medical
like was in progress.  "Just down the road" was ~1200 km (~750 miles)
_west_ , over some pretty crap roads.

Once the giggles had died down, she unmuted the call and something to
the effect of "Mate, you might have a _slightly_ different idea of 'real
quick' than I do - I'm going to be 2 days driving there, a day doing
what you want, then 2 days coming back.  That's me booked for a whole week."

Sheer disbelief and incredulity came down the line.

"Ok, jump on a browser and bring up Google Maps - ask for a route from
Rockhampton, Queensland to West Woop Woop, Queensland"  (I can't
remember the name of the actual town)

"Can't you book a flight?"

"Umm... to what airport?  And I still have to take all my tools and
parts - that's about a tonne of stuff - with me. If you want me to take
off tomorrow, I'll be travelling and working over the weekend - you'll
have to talk to the boss and get his ok."

"You just said you weren't flying"

The two kept talking past each other - the outbound Australianisms being
as incomprehensible as the inbound Americanisms - so she eventually gave
up, conferenced Him-Wot-Takes-The-Blame into the call, and gratefully
dropped out.

She ended up going out that way a few months later when enough work had
built up to justify a non-urgent trip.

Dread God Finagle must have sicced his mad Guinness-swilling prophet
Murphy onto the case, when she made repairs needed and had to ring their
ops centre.  It was the usual desert stinking hotness - 40-odd degrees C
and sub 50% humidity, by contrast with the past few days we've had here
(35-38 degrees C, 80%+ humidity, and some smoke haze from the bushfires
you may have heard about).

After doing the professionally-needed stuff, she was chatting with the
guy on the other end and mentioned she had had to chuck some thongs on
before jumping out of the ute - she later reckoned she could _hear_ the
poor sod blush.  As sis later put it, "That's when I found out that I
was talking South West Pacific English about footwear and the poor bloke
on the other end was listening in North East Pacific English about undies."

On 8/12/19 9:36 pm, Ewan wrote:
>> “The difference between England and the United States is that in England a hundred miles is a long way, and in the US a hundred years is a long time” Probably read that here on this list :-)
> That’s because we have traffic (see the Texan/New Yorker joke) ...
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