Carol the Dabbler

If I get a vote, I prefer Tomaten, simply because I'd have no idea what Paradeiser are if you hadn't clued me in. By the way, tomatoes are native to Central America, where the indigenous word, tomatl was adopted into Spanish as tomate, which in English became tomato. So that's another point in favor of Tomaten. That same sort of replacement of localisms takes place within the US (since this country is about the same size as all of Europe). I'm sitting here in Indiana wearing a pair of what I call tennis shoes, but hubby Alex (who is from upstate New York, 500 miles or 800 kilometers away) calls sneakers. That latter term is kinda taking over hereabouts too, probably due to television.

That was posted a while back, as you can see. Lately I've been noticing British people saying things that I thought were Americanisms (e.g., "pants" in the sense of trousers) and vice versa (e.g., I think "gone missing" or "went missing" is originally British, but it's a very succinct way of expressing a specific concept). This has been going on for hundreds of years, of course. 'Way back when, if a character in a British play was supposed to be an American (probably played by a British actor, since the accents hadn't had time to diverge much), the first words out of his/her mouth would be "I guess" in the sense of "I suppose" -- but I'm pretty sure that expression started being used over there a long time ago.

Agreed! Are you on AO3 or any other fanfic site?

Hello, Lanx, and welcome to Sherlock Forum! Judging by your varied interests, you should fit in very well here. I have a couple of questions for you: 1. What are the names of your three cats? 2. What species is your avatar photo? (Doesn't quite look like either a cat or a millipede!) Also, feel free to reply to any threads that interest you, regardless of how long ago they were posted. Also feel free to start new threads. (Your first few posts will not become visible until they're been approved by a moderator, so don't panic if you don't see them for a while.)

Don't worry, I'll see anything you post here. Also, I suspect that other people are interested too.

Congratulations -- and please keep us posted!

Do you plan to stay in touch with them?

That was very thoughtful of you. I suspect a lot of people would have just yelled "yippee!" on their way out the door, regardless of how much help they'd been given. Congratulations!

By the way, the little oval symbol seems to be an eye -- so with a slash through it, that means you can't be seen.

OK, I logged into my test account, and it says I'm anonymous! So thank you very much, Douglas, you've given us enough info to be able to reproduce the symptoms ourselves.

We do need to look into that possibility! (But I'm sure it's *pleasantly* shocked.) No you haven't, you've reported an apparent software bug that's likely to cause problems for other members in the future if it can't be tracked down and fixed. (Trust me -- I worked in software support for 20 years, and tips from users were our biggest and best source of information.) So, if you would be so kind: Is the "Anonymous" message displayed *instead* of your user name and/or your mini-profile, Or is it displayed as an extra bit of info within your mini-profile, Or something else that hasn't occurred to me? Thank you for your assistance.

@Douglas-- sorry, I must have added this to my post after you had already responded to my first version:

@Banshee -- I'm pretty sure Douglas is referring to positioning his cursor (the one that can be moved with one's mouse or touchpad) on his name above his avatar picture. This would normally display an abbreviated version of his profile, while giving him the option of displaying the complete version. (I'm not sure how to do a screenshot of that, either, since those things are displayed only while the cursor is in that position.) @Douglas -- Does it also display the things that I mentioned to Banshee, or does it merely say that you're anonymous? If it does show more than just "you're anonymous," where does that message appear in relation to the other things?

I checked just now, and Jagger's knighthood was, logically enough, for "service to popular music." I seem to recall liking some of his songs 'way back when. I'm not much into music in general, so I haven't kept up, but apparently he's still at it (and well regarded) in his eighties. Jeremy Brett is mostly known for just two roles, Freddy Eynsford-Hill in the movie My Fair Lady and of course Sherlock Holmes. The latter, especially, is very high-quality stuff, but due to his poor health and his death at age 61, there was precious little of it. Not sure how the two could be compared. (Though I won't exactly argue with you. ) We are NOT one of those stuffy forums that will scold you for posting in an "old" thread. In fact, as long as your post is polite, relevant, and all that usual stuff, we actually enjoy new input!

Hey, "this kind of thing" is the reason that there are moderators. Please don't take our job away! Even if it's not currently impeding your use of the forum, it's not supposed to be doing that, so the staff needs to look into it. So I'm glad that you brought it to our attention.

That's very odd -- you look fine to me. Oh, wait a minute -- maybe I can see who you are because I'm a moderator. Let me see how you look from my husband's account. ****************** Well, you look like Douglas from there as well, and Hubby hadn't even logged in. I'll let the Admins know, but for now just pretend it doesn't say you're anonymous!

I'm not sure what you're asking, Douglas. I do recall seeing a way to become anonymous -- but you don't seem to be anonymous, at least not when you posted this thread. Could you give us some details?

You've got far more stamina than I do! I've read maybe half of ACD's Holmes stories over the past several years. I enjoyed most of them, some more than others of course. You're probably right that the adaptations have helped keep the stories alive. But if they hadn't been popular as first published, they'd never have been adapted. You'd be amazed how many people can read right over arithmetic errors and other inconsistencies without noticing them, because they're only paying attention to the plot. I agree that BBC Sherlock is (for the most part) the best of the modern-day adaptations. But if you haven't already seen them, you should check out Grenada Television's Victorian-era adaptations with Jeremy Brett as Holmes.

Hey, Douglas, it's good to see you back! Do have a look around, and reply to whatever strikes your fancy -- or start something new.

I haven't looked to see what specific passage of Doyle's you're talking about -- but sounds like it could be merely another example of Arthur "Continuity" Doyle's inattention to detail. He considered the Holmes stories to be mere potboilers, with his historical fiction being his true legacy (and apparently the reason he was knighted). ... which presumably explains why Holmes is still so popular, despite ACD's sloppy writing. Hey, no need to apologize for an honest mistake!

I doubt that's what Holmes meant. I've never heard it used that way, but of course I speak American (rather than British) English, so I checked the Collins Dictionary (my favorite online dictionary that covers both American and British usage), and its only British definition as a non-transitive verb is "to practise medicine." Well, there's my new bit of knowledge for the day! I've always thought that "Covent Garden" refers specifically to the market -- and Wikipedia confirms that it used to be a wholesale vegetable market (i.e., selling things that grown in gardens), as seen in My Fair Lady (after having been the garden, orchard, etc. of a monastery or convent).

Alex sent me links to some new-ish articles regarding Sherlock's future. As usual, they mostly speculate, but there's one published in October 2025 that quotes a Cumberbatch interview from Variety in January of 2025: He may be gently saying it's got to be better than what we've seen most recently. (No argument from me!) Then there's a June 2025 article from ComicBook.com that summarizes itself similarly: I agree. I suspect it would take a major stroke of plot inspiration hitting Moffat and/or Gatiss -- something that Cumberbatch and Freeman just couldn't turn down. Given enough time, that's likely to happen, with the main question being "how much time is enough"?

Thank you. Oddly enough, I wasn't sure what the original title means till I looked up the translation of "granja." Here in the US, "Grange" is the name of an organization of farmers, but I've just discovered that "grange" can also mean "farm" (just as "granja" does in Spanish), or more precisely what I'd call a "farmstead," meaning the house, barn, and cluster of other buildings on a farm. Based on other other translations I found for "granja," I suspect is has the same sort of connotation. I just thought they might be interested -- and glad to know that someone is finding the chronology interesting and helpful. The stories are a bit old-fashioned -- which I suppose is why the more recent TV / movie adaptations have updated them, often (as with Sherlock) leaving them with very little resemblance to the original stories. I like some better than others (having read maybe half so far), but I've never sat down and tried to read them straight through -- just a story now and then.

I agree, @Karnak -- I looked, and that's exactly how the story begins. Your analysis seems sound. Unfortunately, @Chronologist hasn't checked in for a while, and is not following this thread. I'm not terribly well versed in the original Holmes stories, though. Hopefully @Brontodon or @HerlockSholmesor someone who's more of a Holmes buff than I am will come along soon. Welcome to Sherlock Forum! Please make yourself at home. I know some Spanish, so am curious -- what is the story's title in Spanish?

OK, was wondering if that sunshine had anything to do with whatever the joke was. I shall now laugh.