What's in a name?

I suppose everyone has to some extent the desire to appear sophisticated, one way or another. You see a lot of it in shop names. Hairdressers shops in the UK are among the best. Among my favourites are "Curling Me Softly" and, not quite so clever, "A Cut Above". At the far end of Calle Aragon, here in Vigo, is a place that calls itself "Miss Uñas y Miss Pelos", a play on "mis", plural form of "my" in Spanish, making the name "My Hair and My Nails". However, "miss" has long been used to denote a beauty contest winner; think of Miss England, Miss Spain and, of course, Miss World! 

Here they seem to like to use English to give that air of sophistication. There's a women's clothes shop, a boutique I suppose, not far from our flat that calls itself "Mileidy". Pronounced Spanish style that says My Lady. There you go. Even calling a clothes shop a "boutique" is a very ancient example of that desire to sound a little clever and up market. 

Sometimes the English goes a little awry, as does the use of French in shop names in the UK. I have seen a few cafes that try it on by calling themselves "Coffee and Bar". Okay, so "café" translates as "coffee" on many occasions but not all the time! Then there is a launderette with the name "Wash-Up" - not quite right! I prefer the more modern, witty "Wash@pp" - you see, there is an app for everything. And there is a car repair place, or maybe a tyre servicing place, on our street called "Bestdrive", a name that has Phil spluttering and harrumphing almost every time he goes past it, for the sheer nonsense of the name. Much better is the windscreen replacement workshop called "Ponteglass", possibly with a connection to the city of Pontevedra but also making a little linguistic game of itself: "ponte" is the imperative form of the verb "ponerse" which makes the name say "put yourself some glass (in your car)". 

Perhaps the best I have seen to date was the shop sign I saw yesterday as I strolled around the centre of Vigo. On one corner I came across a shop selling seeds and plants and the makings of home-brewed beer. An interesting combination! Although in the past I have known a number of people who had allotments and also took an interest in brewing their own ale. However, it was the name of the shop that struck me most of all: "WEED AND BEER". I found myself wondering if the owners are aware of the meaning of weed to most young British speakers of English. Do folk looking for some interesting alternative to tobacco wander into the shop asking to buy weed? This is Vigo, not Amsterdam! 

And sometimes it's hard enough getting your own language right without messing around putting incorrect foreign stuff in there as well. We have recently noticed an trend for the word "of" to disappear. Or, indeed, sometimes to appear where it shouldn't. For I don't know how long I have been infuriated by "would/could/should have", correctly abbreviated to "would/could/should've", morphing into "would/could/should OF". But now we find "of" slipping away after the word "couple". So we hear, "a couple things" or "a couple people" or "a couple days ago". Presumable "couple of", said quickly, becomes "coupl'a" and then just slides into "couple" with nothing to follow it. 

Sloppy speaking! 

Grrrrr! It's enough to raise the hackles of any grammar policeman or woman!