This week at work, I taped on my desk the NATO phonetic alphabet, because even in the private sector it gets useful sometimes when spelling something on the phone. Like my own name. And it made me rediscover something, which I already knew from The Wire. Later on, I had a shot of Bushmills whiskey in the local Irish pub, to get rid of the sore throat I have. Which reminded me of another thing I learned from The Wire. So I learned at least two trivial things I learned from The Wire:
1)Quebec is the word used for Q in the NATO phonetic alphabet, which I learned from Lester Freamont in season 2, as he used it.
2)Bushmills is Protestant whiskey, according to the Irish-American McNulty in season 3. He asks for Jameson in an evening at the private school his sons is attending (or about to), the barman offers him Bushmill, which McNulty accepts reluctantly (a little bit more here).
I think the second trivia is more famous than the first, at least among whiskey aficionados. Still strange to think of my country in military terms, and as representative of the letter Q. Moral of those two non story: crime fiction can be quite educational.
I used to work as a travel agent and we used those words for spelling all the time. I would get very confused when dealing with Americans because they used entirely different words. Many younger people were also unfamiliar with the proper words and would often make something up on the spot. it would throw me right off when I would be repeating it for confirmation WEA - W for William, E for Excellent, A for Apple; yes, I'd insist, Whiskey, Echo, Alpha.
ReplyDeleteI use the British version at work.
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