Letters to The Peachy: A Note from the UK by Ron Smith

Hi Peachy,

I was just speaking to my identical twin brother Jim (aka @c_mperman) and we were admiring your correct use of English.

In my professional career, I worked on helicopter and vehicle collaborations with colleagues from a number of countries (including France, Germany, Italy, Spain, The Netherlands and Sweden). 

I was always impressed with the ability of personnel from all these nations to work in English and, at times, I was embarrassed by the poor standards of some of my UK colleagues working in their native language!

The French, in particular are always very precise in their use of tenses and cases. Whenever they looked quizzical over the meaning of something we produced, it was usually due to one of my colleagues poor (native) English.

The Swedish always seemed to be caught out by English nouns that do not change their form in the plural. Deer and sheep would be simple examples, but aircraft and equipment were rather more significant in my work context. In these cases, only the form of the verb indicates whether the sense is singular or plural. The Swedish would invariably get this wrong.

Another problem area is the correct use of the indefinite article ahead of abbreviations and acronyms - thus it is 'an NHS hospital', but 'a NATO flotilla'.

Jim and I have just had our travel memoir 'Two Up Down Under' published. If you look on Amazon.com and click on the blue authors names, you will see something of our history and, in my case, several previous published works.

We share a personal and professional interest in aviation (both private pilots and Fellows of the Royal Aeronautical Society) and we are both interested in photography (of aviation and more general subjects). There are a collection of photographs and other material on our website www.ronandjimsmith.com

Best regards,

Ron Smith

(aka Dr Ron - RV Smith, MSc, PhD, CEng, MInstP, FRAeS)

PS: A fun phrase courtesy of our elder brother Chris (Co-author of the Penguin Guide to Blues Recordings)

When it's it is, it's it's and when it's its, it's its.