On 1/4/2011 8:43 AM harry spake thus:

On Jan 4, 9:18 am, David Nebenzahl wrote:

Not at all; we call them hotplates, or cookers, but not "hobs".
That's one of your quaint UK-isms.

We use the term hob for a split cooker, ie hob and oven separate, as
distinct from the older sort (cooker) where they are in one unit.
Hotplate is the term we would use for the sort of thing you see in
McNasty. ie, big.

Those big nasty things are what we call "grills"*. (Not "grilles", as
you how like to add those spurious "e"s would spell it.)


* Even though technically the thing ain't a grill, because it's just one
big hot surface, not an actually grill.


--
Comment on quaint Usenet customs, from Usenet:

To me, the *plonk...* reminds me of the old man at the public hearing
who stands to make his point, then removes his hearing aid as a sign
that he is not going to hear any rebuttals.