Methu and Ffili is one of those examples where English fails (see what I did there) to have an exact single word translation. Fail isn’t really the same thing as not be able to in my view.
Agreed - just like peidio is “to don’t”! But “fail” is one of the meanings, and good enough to help me find it in GPC 
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Both very commonly used in nice idiomatic Welsh - and remember that ffaelu despite the spelling is usually pronounced ffili over vast areas of Equatorial Wales.
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Watching “Garejis; Dan y Bonet” last night one of the drivers (who was competing with his father) used the expression “Os hewl galed, hen gi”. Can somebody help with the meaning, please? I presume it means something like “if the work is difficult you need someone with experience, not a young pup” Thanks
It’s not an expression I’ve come across before, but my reading of it would be “If it’s a hard road, it’s an old dog” i.e. an older person finds things more difficult than a younger one. However, I could be totally wrong and your interpretation might be the right one.
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Thanks Sharon. I think you are correct, the father was racing the son and the son was winning, so I think he (the father) was saying, in effect, “the reason the race was more difficult for me is because I am old” which is what you said.
They do use some interesting expressions on the programme, it’s one of the reasons I enjoy watching it e.e “ ‘sdim siap arna i yn coginio” and I heard one lady use the word “slowach” which made me smile 
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Sori, just noticed that autocorrect changed “Siaron” to “Sharon”! It weren’t me guv, ‘onest!
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when studying the creation of the Welsh bible, it was suggested that William Salesbury (one of the Elizabeth an translators) invented ei and eu to show a closer correspondence with Latin in order to give Welsh a bit of a status boost in comparison with English
(maybe Aran can comment on whether that is credible since he has a bit of school Latin)
This is correct, though p[ossibly not the motive. It was simply a mistaken idea that the Welsh word (up till then spelt i) for his, her and its was related to the Latin equivalent eius meaning the same three things. It’s not, but anyway the -us ending was simply knocked off, and hey presto…ei!
And one might add that formal/fussy pronunciations of ei as a diphthong (in other words, pronounce as spelt) are simply wrong - vicars, politicians and the like only started rhyming ei with tei once the spelling had been changed. This practice will be banned once I am in charge.
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This version of hypercorrection is a massive bugbear of mine in English. When I hear people pronouncing, for example, forehead or Wednesday like they’re spelt I want to start hurling furniture around. 
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I’m second-guessing myself here: I just mentioned, in another thread, the title of the song by Yr Angen “Fel na Fydd e”. I’ve still never yet caught enough of the lyrics to be sure of the whole song, but the immediate context is:
“Well 'da fi redeg i ffwrdd / os fel na fydd e.”
I’ve always taken this to be “if it’s going to be like that, I’d rather run away,” on the assumption that fydd gets softened because of a fe that isn’t actually there (or something like that). I tried looking it up to check, and I’m now seeing examples that are making me wonder if it’s not actually negation - “if it’s not going to be like that” - but I think I feel happier with my first explanation (partly because it’s not os fydd e ddim fel 'na).
Help! I have now confused myself thoroughly. Will it or won’t it be like that?
A finnau 
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My view on this is that, na here being really 'na = hynna, we would really expect bydd rather than fydd (there’s no trigger for SM there), except that there’s also the undeniable fact of the spoken language that we do encounter a generalised SM with all statement verbs…that’s probably what’s going on here, I would suggest.
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Good to know. I instinctively read it as positive, but it was the absence of an obvious trigger that worried/confused me.
Yes - I think one has to always keep in mind that the generalised SM on statement verbs is very widespread these days.
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Just curious. As a person born and raised in the US, I am wondering how forehead is pronounced in the UK. Because everyone I know here pronounces it as written … ?
Forrid.
Edited to add: Universal literacy is a wonderful thing, but this is one of the down sides. On balance, I think I can live with it. 
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I have to admit that I prefer ‘forrid’, but grew up saying ‘fore-head’, so I do a bit of both, I’m afraid. But what about traditional ‘forrud’ vs spelling-pronunciation ‘forward’? ‘Offen’ or ‘often’? (As in - we’re getting increasingly offen topic, I suspect…)
Edited to add: @sionned - There’s a rhyme that goes “There was a little girl / who had a little curl / right in the middle of her forehead / and when she was good / she was very, very good / but when she was bad, she was horrid.” It only rhymes with the traditional pronunciation of ‘forrid’
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Actually, I’ve known that little rhyme most of my life, and never thought that the rhyme didn’t work with “forehead.” However, we don’t pronounce it as if it were two words (fore-head) so there’s a lot of slack there.
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I’ve heard “forehead” spoken as it is spelt far more frequently than forrid.It is clearly the older pronunciation, I’m hesitant to believe forrid has ever been the common form for the whole UK.
But clearly none of us here are satisfied with the amount of variety even a single language provides us with .