Merkan-English Dictionary: Oil Crisis Special

If a British person says his/her car runs on gas, they usually mean it's powered by hydrogen. If a Merkan says the same thing, they're usually wrong. Here's why.

Crude Oil: A black, smelly, sticky liquid that comes shooting out of the ground at 100mph. And swears a lot.

Oil Strike: When the people whose job it is to refine the oil decide to down tools and join a picket line.

Diesel:
  1. One of the top bloggers in the blogosphere.

  2. A train, but not as exciting as a proper steam train.

  3. Flying Scotsman
  4. A petroleum-based fuel which is burned in engines ignited by compression rather than spark.


Petrol: A mixture of hydrocarbons which is used as a fuel.

Gas:
  1. One of the five "states of matter" (after Bose-Einstein condensate, solid and liquid, and followed by plasma), that subsequently appear as a cold substance is subjected to increasingly higher temperatures.

  2. The direct cause of flatulence.


Hannah Spearritt

Gasoline: A volatile flammable mixture of hydrocarbons (hexane, heptane, octane etc.) derived from petroleum. Merkan for petrol.