ext_78: A picture of a plush animal. It looks a bit like a cross between a duck and a platypus. (Default)
Philip Newton (LJ OpenID) ([identity profile] pne.livejournal.com) wrote in [personal profile] pne 2008-11-11 08:34 pm (UTC)

Oh, and you twigged? Is that British? I've never heard that before.

Yes, I think it's British -- for "caught on", roughly. Or, as the Urban Dictionary puts it, "To comprehend, understand, get hip to, grok. The news media are finally twigging to the fact that..."

As for the Mutter-mutter sound correspondence, I know at least the way I pronounce it, the first vowel is "mother" is the same as the one in "mutter," so could it be that she's using the German word with the English vowel?

Ah, no, those were just words I used to illustrate the sounds in question - I was looking for a sequence of letters that is a word in both English and German.

The actual word she used was "bumm" to translate "bum".

Now, "bumm" *is* a word in German, but only kind of; it's onomatopoeia for something heavy falling down, or for the sound of a canon shot, or similar "thumpy" noises. Certainly not with a meaning of its own, let alone one related to being a lazy bum.

Hm... maybe she got it from "bump" (English) / "bumm" (German)?

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