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Picture of Kalleh
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I am reading a book by an English author, and she used the word tetchy. I hadn't heard it before, but it's in 25 online dictionaries so it's obviously common. Is it more used in England or is it common here too and I've just not heard it?
 
Posts: 24735 | Location: Chicago, USAReply With QuoteReport This Post
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Tetchy

No, I haven't heard it, though I wouldn't be at all surprised if it's used in the southern states. I have heard the U.S. variation touchy.
 
Posts: 2878 | Location: Shoreline, WA, USAReply With QuoteReport This Post
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Picture of BobHale
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Pretty commonplace here.


"No man but a blockhead ever wrote except for money." Samuel Johnson.
 
Posts: 9421 | Location: EnglandReply With QuoteReport This Post
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I've heard southerners mention tetched, as a bit eccentric (loony, to you and me).
 
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Picture of zmježd
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I would have imagined it an US regionalism (especially in the set phrase "a might tetchy"), but I guess I've just been exposed to too much Britannia ...


Ceci n'est pas un seing.
 
Posts: 5148 | Location: R'lyehReply With QuoteReport This Post
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IIRC, it was fairly common in the USA back in the 1950s, but is rare now. I think it was used in some of the old Warner Brothers cartoons, especially by Buggs Bunny.


It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society. -J. Krishnamurti
 
Posts: 6168 | Location: Muncie, IndianaReply With QuoteReport This Post
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Picture of arnie
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I've heard southerners mention tetched

I think that might be their version of "touched", as in, "touched by the moon".


Build a man a fire and he's warm for a day. Set a man on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life.
 
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