Portsmouth woman asks on live radio what the term Skate means.

I don't know if anyone else heard this but as I don't sleep too well I had the radio on last night listening to Up All Night on BBC Radio 5 when at around 2.30 to 3.00 am they were talking about etymology and were discussing many words with nauticul roots such as doldrums and whistle down the wind when a woman called in said she had moved to Portsmouth about 40 years ago and she had come across the word Skate. She wanted to know what it meant.

They started to suggest it was a fish but then they were obviously looking it up on the internet and started to talk about lonely sailors when it occured to them what the term meant and they started to waffle and say they shouldn't talk about it anymore.

It was just before the 3.00 am news and as it was dark and I was half awake I didn't notice the precise time.

Did anyone else hear it?

 

When I was last in England it cost about 50p more than cod in the local chippy

 

It meant that those from the SO postcode could find no better way of "insulting" those in the PO post code. So they ran a competition in a magazine and chose a word already used the Pomponians to describe on shore saliors.

 

Not quite as good as "scum" is it?

 

I have heard Saints fans refer to Pompey fans as scummers...think it's a generic term for rival.

 

Come on now boys and girl no bickering.

I found the presenters huffing and puffing with embarrassment the amusing thing about the piece but I was beginning to wonder whether I had imagined it all.

 

Never said it was my stripey friend.

 

we're less stripey now.

 

all you have to do is read this - when you get there, you'll know when, go arrrrgh, pompey saddos !!

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2005/jan/23/newsstory.sport8?INTCMP=SRCH

if you want to jump to the right spot, see the para that starts, Pat Symes .....

 

It's all a bit petty, on both sides (scum/skate), granted! However, many teams are labelled Scum by their rivals - only Pompey are Skates. It's so much more specific, don't you think?

 

You're not scummers, I love you guys!!!!

 

.

 

They use scum and the bs strike to fuel their hatred , their existence is largely down to us existing , can you imagine a portsmouth fan without using the word scummer ?
Their hatred of us is their fabric , they always make me chuckle the trampy island inbreds .

 

Got it up on Listen Again and about 2 hrs 56 minutes into the programme, the question gets asked. Yeah, it's quite funny when the expert looks it up on an online dictionary [because he didn't know it, as it is peculiar to Pompey only], and starts reading out the entry... it originates in Portsmouth about sailors when getting lonely at sea... aaah..!

And as StG says, they get into a bit of a faff trying to extricate themselves from a slightly embarrassing situation, with the woman expecting the answer to the question, on the end of the phone. A good chuckle.

 

Let's face it St G, this was a trap to get someone to mention the Southampton Company Union Men or whatever wasn't it. Even Wikipedia knows that's not true now

 

This was posted as a piece of fun as TSS says it was quite amusing listening to the presenter getting in a bit of faff over what he was reading.

As for the woman's motive I wouldn't dream of assuming what that was. As we discussed yesterday with regards to accents she didn't sound local to either city but then neither do I.

TSS has at least reassured me that I wasn't imagining it.

 

http://www.dailyecho.co.uk/news/9893315.Hampshire_man_arrested_for_abusing_footballer_on_Twitter/ I wonder who that can be?

 

You did, you dreamed it.

 

The feeling is mutual and getting stronger all the time.

Please don't confuse a little bit of silliness with being beastly.

 

As to the woman who phoned in, I think she was quite innocently doing so. The presenter had asked for clean slang nautical references, and if you're someone who has no idea what the meaning is, as she clearly didn't, then you may innocently ring the show. As to her accent, I can't remember whether she said she'd moved to the Portsmouth area 14 or 40 years ago, so wasn't from the region, [I assume it was 14] and ever since she'd been living there she'd heard that sailors were called Skates. The resident expert had never heard of it, but he guessed it was something to do with the fish, rather than the shoes for wearing on ice [not a great intellectual leap there]. What surprised me was that it originated in Portsmouth, much further back in time than any modern claims to fame.