Pants/Correcting myself

[Neil Ward]

Jen P said:

<<Would a singular "pair of pants" (sorry, you naughty Brits...) be a pant?
(I suppose I could call them a "pair of jeans", but I just want to yank
Neil's chain a bit) >>

Hands off my chain - I've just had it oiled.

This reminds me of an annoying habit some people have of calling plural
things by their singular form.  In a particularly snooty menswear shop, for
example the salesman wouldn't say "these are nice trousers", he'd say "this
is a nice trouser".  That makes me want to scream and run out of the shop.
In fact, I often do that anyway, just to freak them out

My father - a cobbler by trade (now retired) - does this with shoes.  When I
was a schoolboy, and we were visiting a shoe shop, he might pick up a pair
of shoes and say "that's a nice shoe" and I would think to myself, 'which
one do you mean - aren't we going to buy both of them?'

Thinking about it, it's something to do with using the singular to remove
specificity.  "A nice shoe" is really short for that's a "nice shoe design"
or "make of shoe".  If you say "pair of shoes" it can only refer to the
particular pair in front of you.  Yes...

I'm not sure why I even mentioned all that.  I think I should drink some
coffee before saying anything else stupid.

CORRECTION!!!

I said:

<< British cuisine is confusing; that's it's appeal! >>

Eek!  I meant "its appeal".  I can't believe I did that.

Neil (banging head on table)