How do you do ?  What do you do ? Do you remember when your identity was the job you did ? When the moment you left a job you were forgotten by colleagues you thought were close friends ?

There are a lot of things that in French are named in honour of the job they do.  Important jobs like corkscrews (un tire-bouchon – it pulls corks), mundane jobs like key rings (un porte-clé – it carries your keys) , tin-openers (un ouvre-boîte – it does what it says on the tin !), jobs that add to your comfort (un chauffe-serviette – it warms your towel) and that make you feel uncomfortable (pèse-personne – it weighs people)

Some run in families – porte-clés, porte-monnaie (purse to carry your change), un porte-feuille (wallet to carries your papers), un porte-couteau (to support your knife & fork), un porte-bonheur (a lucky charm to carry your happiness). You can even get back to work as un porte-parole (a spokesman to carry other people’s words)  The porte family is especially hard-working as lots of things have to be carried or stashed.

The couvre family is a bit smaller, but you can extend it at will ! un couvre-lit covers your bed, un couvre-pieds covers your feet (quilt) , un couvre-plat covers a dish etc, un couvre-chef covers your head (slangy word for headgear)

A saucepan that cooks everything together is un faitout (does everything) and a lay about is un fainéant (does nothing)

un chauffe-bain, un chauffe-lit, un chauffe-eau all things that warm

Some are singletons like un passe-temps (a pastime)  un passe-thé (tea strainer), un tournevis (screwdriver – turns screws).  Un taille-crayons sharpens pencils, un casse-noisettes cracks nuts, un allume-cigares lights cigars (in a car) and un grille-pain produces toast.

In the great struggle to remember whether a word is masculine or feminine, it is easy to remember this lot – they all work hard so they’re masculin. Un rhymes with grunt !

The most wonderful thing is that just like the French, you can make them up as you go along.  You know what it does but you don’t know the word ?  then just say J’ai besoin d’un nettoie-pipe, d’un casse-pierre, d’un frappe-clou  The first one’s OK, but the rest’s rubbish, but they will understand what you mean !

My all time favourite is un Casse-croûte – a snack (breaking a crust !) or rather that is after the tire-bouchon......