Reecommendtions for a pithy remark

[mercalia]

Mr Flinders works with many nationalities. He reminded me of the old saw that the Germans are too truthful to be polite, and the British are too polite to be truthful. He prefers to have to deal with the German approach if he has to choose. (I hasten to add that he is both polite and truthful; I am more German, with dangerous Anglo-Saxon overtones if lied to or otherwise crossed.)

I have a lot of American friends who I like very much and who are very decent people with a good sense of proportion, but I do find that, well, how can I put this? that some other Americans, especially younger ones, seem to need to be told how wonderful they are for doing even the most basic tasks or they get all hurt. That's tiring if you are like me, and tend only to seriously enthuse when someone has done something very special.

ah that explains why Trump is such a chump?

[horizon]

'm currently working with someone in the US who is unable to take the hint that writing the user instructions and data recording sections of his batch manufacturing records using 7 point arial font, single line spacing with multiple actions per paragraph is not a recipe for success.

Suggestions for suitable punishments and or pithy remarks are welcome.

Your problem IMV is your use of language - "large" simply won't do it, he's American after all. My guess is that your colleague is using a Whopper size font. This is the smallest he knows about (the medium and regular sizes have been deleted and the small doesn't actually exist and never did). You may want to move him on gently to the mega-family-tub-size. This is still quite small but an improvement. However you are really aiming for "our largest size ever" (in UK terms a sort of middling medium but not bad). For the best result however, you might want to end up with, in UK English, reasonably large so for your colleague that will be Grand Mac Big Daddy with a 1.5 litre Coke and unlimited fries. For one.

[Audax67]

It is much easier to communicate with Europeans %+)

Except that many of them learn language use from American films...

Actually, they learn to use language at home and in primary school. They learn English a bit later.

[Vorpal]

It is much easier to communicate with Europeans %+)

Except that many of them learn language use from American films...

Actually, they learn to use language at home and in primary school. They learn English a bit later.

Of course, I meant English language use.

And most of them at least begin to learn that in primary school, as well. Thoguh the schools don't do a good job of teaching subtleties, slang, or cultural context.

But I have worked with many people who gotten most of their functional use of English from American films and television.

[Audax67]

For varying values of functional, judging by social media posts.