Newsgroup: it.cultura.linguistica.inglese
Titolo: a backer

In a book I'm reading, a guy asks a mate: "Do you want a backer?"
Since the second guy answers "No thank you, I'm going in a different 
direction", I guessed that "a backer" is a lift on a back of the bike/mope.
Am I right? If so, is it a common expression?
Tabhall

 If so, is it a common expression?
Not as far as I know. Where is the book set?

 Not as far as I know. Where is the book set?
For no good reason, I wonder if this usage could be Australian.

 If so, is it a common expression?
I'm told it can be found in an online Irish slang dictionary.
"A backer" normally means someone who provides money.

 Not as far as I know. Where is the book set?
Ireland...thanks to your hint, I got it:
http://www.dublinpeople.com/interact/dublindictionary/e-j.shtml
Look for "give a backer"!
Tabhall

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I have often given someone a lift on my bicycle, but always on the chassis
bar between the seat and the handlebars, never in the back. In fact, there
was nowhere to sit in the back except on the fender, and a rider would have
crushed it.
I often gave rides to friends when I had a motorcycle, always in the back,
and never in the front.
Joe from Massachusetts

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In "La vita è bella", the hero gives his wife a ride on the bar of the
bicycle as described above, and at the same time his son is seated on the
handlebars. I wonder if the Irish would call this a "backer" too?
Joe from Massachusetts

  I wonder if the Irish would call this a "backer" too?
That would be a "fronter" :-)
Tabhall


Since it's not in that Irish dictionary, I guess you found it in the Ladino
dictionary?  :>)
Joe from Massachusetts

 dictionary?  :>)
Not exactly...Considering that you native speakers invent about 10.000 
new words a year, I just thought that, having spent a lot of my spare 
time learning English troughout so many years, I had gained the right to 
invent a tiny one myself :-)
Tabhall

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You GO! You've earned the right. Just put some thought into it, and don't 
expect all of them to work the way you expect, or that everyone will "get 
it."
Anyone who has studied English as another language deserves a medal.
-- 
Joey DoWop Dee
Remember: It is To Laugh.
Il mio gatto
http://tinyurl.com/2a5u8b

 Anyone who has studied English as another language deserves a medal.
I read "deserves a meal" and suddenly got hungry. Then I realized. Too 
bad.
Okay, off to bed.
8-)
-- 
Laz - [ 
http://www.dimensionedelta.net
 ]
[ 
http://www.josswhedon.it
 | 
http://www.miltoncaniff.net
 ]
"I aim to misbehave". 

 
Just as well... they say it's not a good idea to eat just before going to 
bed.
Sleep tight.
Don't let the bedbugs bite!
((Strange thing to say.))


 wrote in message
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Here's another word not found in that Irish dictionary.
When I was growing up in NYC, we had a tin measuring cup, which my Irish
parents called "the ponnie". We thought they had invented the word, and I
had no idea what the word meant until I saw something about Ireland on TV a
few years ago, where a woman described bringing a "ponnie" to school so that
she would have something to drink milk from. Evidently each child had to
bring his own tin cup to school from home.
Joe from Massachusetts