The belt and braces approach
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i0t first sight this sign, erected by Sevenoaks Council at a Kent beauty spot, appears to be over egging the pudding. But a delve into the Concise Oxford Dictionary reveals that a truck and a lorry is not exactly the same thing. Oh, dear me, no. A lorry is a "truck for transporting goods" while a truck is a "motor vehicle for transporting of goods". You see what I mean? While a "truck" and a "lorry" are both involved in transporting goods only the truck is also a motor vehicle.
Fleet managers should in future be wary when ordering vehicles. Specify "trucks" and not "lorries" if you wont to make sure your goods get delivered. To add to the fun, a Daily Telegraph columnist last week attacked Alistair Morton, Eurotunnel chairman, for using the Americanism "trucks" and not the English "lorries". Wrong, thundered letter writer Stephen Beet of Alfreton: "Perhaps he the columnist) does not realise that in the North of England at least, the word "truck" has been in common usage for longer than anyone can remember. Indeed, were he a classicist he would know that the word derives from trokhos, the Greek word for wheel." Now, I thought everybody knew that.