"works like a champ" or "works like a charm"



  • Which phrase is more correct to say something is working smoothly like butter?



  • I always use google battle for this.

    http://www.googlebattle.com/?domain=%22works+like+a+champ%22+&domain2=%22works+like+a+charm%22&submit=Go!

    Works like a champ!

     

    edit:

    also found this which might actually be sort of right.

    The two phrases can have the same meanings but with a subtly different flavor. “Works like a charm” is usually meant to describe success in a smooth, unobtrusive, non-confrontational manner, whereas “works like a champ” is aggressive success, victory, conspicuous dominance.



  • @stratos said:

    I always use google battle for this.

    http://www.googlebattle.com/?domain=%22works+like+a+champ%22+&domain2=%22works+like+a+charm%22&submit=Go!

    Works like a champ!

     

    edit:

    also found this which might actually be sort of right.

    The two phrases can have the same meanings but with a subtly different
    flavor. “Works like a charm” is usually meant to describe success in a
    smooth, unobtrusive, non-confrontational manner, whereas “works like a
    champ” is aggressive success, victory, conspicuous dominance.

    That googlebattle works like a charm!

    Thx for the link.


  •  @Nagesh said:

    Which phrase is more correct to say something is working smoothly like butter?
    You apparently have never had cold butter.

     



  • @El_Heffe said:

     @Nagesh said:

    Which phrase is more correct to say something is working smoothly like butter?
    You apparently have never had cold butter.

     

    Butter in India is churned from butter milk, which comes from Dahi which comes from milk. There's no equal in your culture for butter or ghee from what i heard. What you call butter we like to call "english butter".

    It comes in slabs and is salty and yellow in color. Taste total different from butter we are making at home.



  •  In the netherlands and I think the entire EU region, you aren't even allowed to call a product butter if it isn't made of cows milk.



  •  Depends what meaning you want to convey.  Do you want to say that something works "as if by magic"?  Or that it works "better than any conceivable alternative"?

    Some day I'm going to figure out what the Brits are on about when they say someone "slept like a top".  What, spinning around and around until you fall over, that kind of sleeping?


  • Discourse touched me in a no-no place

    @da Doctah said:

    Some day I'm going to figure out what the Brits are on about when they say someone "slept like a top".
    I've never heard anyone say that here. The usual metaphor used is a log, not a top. Explanation here if you're that interested in it:

    The expression 'sleep like a top' is quite old and is recorded from at least 1693, when it appeared in William Congreve's The Old Batchelour:

       "Should he seem to rouse, 'tis but well lashing him, and he will sleep like a Top."


  • @stratos said:

     In the netherlands and I think the entire EU region, you aren't even allowed to call a product butter if it isn't made of cows milk.

    I think that might be the case in the U.S. also.  However, many people still use the term "butter" even when they are actually referring to margarine.

     



  • @El_Heffe said:

    @stratos said:

     In the netherlands and I think the entire EU region, you aren't even allowed to call a product butter if it isn't made of cows milk.

    I think that might be the case in the U.S. also.  However, many people still use the term "butter" even when they are actually referring to margarine.

     

     

    So what do they call the stuff you make PB&J sandwiches out of?  Peanut slurry?



  • @da Doctah said:

    Peanut slurry?
     

    Nut slop.



  • @da Doctah said:

    @El_Heffe said:

    @stratos said:

     In the netherlands and I think the entire EU region, you aren't even allowed to call a product butter if it isn't made of cows milk.

    I think that might be the case in the U.S. also. 

     

    So what do they call the stuff you make PB&J sandwiches out of?  Peanut slurry?

     

    In Queensland, Australia, at least, "Peanut Butter" was illegal and is/was known as "Peanut Paste". Ref

    So we had two Americanisms to work out for "PB&J": here "jelly" is a geletain based desert (known to you as its genericised trademark jello). One would put jam on their sandwiches.

    I prefer peanut paste and honey sandwiches though. :)

     



  •  In NL we actually call it in literal translation  "peanut cheese".  Although I'm fairly sure we have a similar rule about cheese.  But perhaps it's one word or something, i dunno. I'm sure there is a wikipedia article about it.



  • @Zemm said:

    So we had two Americanisms to work out for "PB&J": here "jelly" is a geletain based desert (known to you as its genericised trademark jello). One would put jam on their sandwiches.
     

    In the US, jam, jelly, preserves, and even butter (as in "apple butter" which is quite excellent stuff) are all distinct types of sweet fruit spreads.  "Jelly" is made pretty much purely from juice and gelatin; it has no fruit chunks in it and is generally more liquid than "jello." Jam is more a smooth thick liquid and is pretty much made of the entire fruit mashed up in it (it's not just the juice).  Come to think of it, "preserves" is pretty close to "jam", but has whole chunks of the fruit (instead of mashed chunks; this is perhaps a sliding scale). Apple butter is something quite different, and I don't know why they call it "butter" except for similarity to things like peanut butter.

    Also, in the US, butter is indeed made from milk; everything else is "spread" or margarine.  Also, "buttermilk" is the liquid left *after* butter has been churned from cream, rather than the liquid used to make butter.  Buttermilk is actually pretty healthy stuff, because all the fat has been churned out as butter.

    (I fondly remember elementary school classes where we all had baby food jars filled with heavy cream. We were instructed to just stand there and shake them - butter formed like magic!  It's pretty cool to see in action, to be honest.)


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