According to my Dictionary of American Family Names, your husband's family name, (several varieties in spelling), it means an descendant of Geoffrey or Jeffrey (God's peace).


My DH's family name has something to do with a woodpecker.

Well that's not so bad then - didn't know that - thanks! My maiden name meant "New Mountain" - funny that you just don't think of those things generally.

You made me laugh with your DH family name's translation.

Rommel's son was (maybe still is) the Mayor of Stuttgart.

I just tell him to live up to its antecedents.

What's his name?

Manfred Rommel.
He was the mayor when I lived in Germany over 20 years ago. Probably either retired or has passed away.

There are 60 Rommels and 2 Himmlers in the Berlin phone book. No Hitlers, though.

You're comedy. The Korean war stalemates with a UN force that is only half American, and this becomes an American defeat, yet the Iraq War, which had about 90% of its troop strength comprised of US forces, is an Allied win and a US loss simultaneously?

You're just letting your nationalistic hackles blind you to the reality. Like it or not, Iraq was largely a US operation, which was initially won and will be ultimately lost thanks to American (mis)management. While I would surely love to share the glory and the blame with the coalition, there isn't all that much glory and I'd feel a bit guilty about parceling out the blame, given the circumstances.

That doesn't change the fact that Iraq was a military victory. The Iraqi military was destroyed, the leadership eliminated and the capital captured, all classic symbols of a military victory. The only problem was that this wasn't enough to create a sustainable political win. You should be happy that Gordon Brown will be able to retreat from the steaming pile with the UK's prestige relatively unscathed, unlike Bush's successor, whoever that may be.

Im trying reeely hard not to go there
Rob (aged 9)

One thing-you forgot the American taxpayer will also be reminded of this excursion for a looooooooonnnnnnnnnnngggggg time to come.See Alan Greenspan's new book....

When I first got here, we did have some fun disputes with the locals, on who won the war, but they were good natured. If anyone got serious, I asked them if they were just out to score cheap points or if they wanted to discuss the facts and go on from there.

Good job, there's no room.

So, why DO the Americans think they alone won the war? Is this taught to them at school or what?
Rob

I think that some of us learned to take the piss out of our British cousins. However, not all said cousins have figured out how to take a joke.

My earlier comment, despite its pithiness, was actually accurate. Most Americans don't know much about the UK, so they're left with the war, bad food, the Royals, and bad teeth for joke material. Since they're too polite to mock you for your orthodontia, you're stuck with the other three. Chin up.

Ive seen worse teeth here in GA than I ever did in England, oh well

perhaps not directly, more by omission. Example: on the wall of my office I have a National Geographic map of Great Britain and Ireland. Down at the bottom of the map a section of Normandy is visible, and the National Geographic cartographers have labeled the D-Day beaches on it. Except they've only labeled the beaches where Americans landed (Utah and Omaha): the beaches assaulted by British and Canadian troops (Gold, Sword, Juno) are mysteriously absent. That's the kind of thing that fosters ignorance and winds British people up.