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So, (sorry Des) we have a have a word at work which spread. Originally started by an ex miner a huge guy around 25 stone and probably a 30 stone personality we call Benny but his name is Simon he's been working there for 20 odd years and refers to everybody as a word which is rather hard to write the pronunciation of, its like a very strange pronunciation of the word "Water". Its a little crossed with "Warter" or more like "waater?" "Waar-ter". So Benny who is Simon would say "hows it going waarter" which then got shortened to just "waar-ter" as his greeting. People then started upon seeing Benny who is Simon greeting him with "hows it going fat waar-ter" which got shortened to "Fat Waater". So the greeting became Benny's thing a simple exchange of "Waar-ter" and "Fat Waart-er". Strange, but fine, and to hear Benny utter that is the most natural thing in the world as natural as anybody else just saying hello. I once asked him where it originated from and he said it was a miners thing or it may just have been something he'd picked up from that particular mine he was working in near Cannock Chase i can't recall.

The problem is over the years it spread and other people all started calling each other "waar-ter" some with even weirder pronunciations "werter" "Weerter" and god knows what else, the vast majority sounding completely bizarre and then when this week I had to walk into one of the office's and some young lad (he looked about 12) tried to refer to me as "waar-ter" with a pronunciation that even I feared to attempt to type I felt like asking him to "pick a window" as they say.

I was wondering if any of you lads from Mining backgrounds or family's who were miners had ever heard of the word I'm so badly attempting to put in to print ?