Do you use an "M" when you sneeze?

The topic today: French sound effects!!

What sound do you make when you sneeze? If you're American, it's "Achoo!" However, in France, you have to add an "m" at the end: "Atchoum!" Do French people and American people really sneeze differently? I would've said no, but I swear I heard one of the women in our lab add a distinctive "m" at the end of her sneeze today. I'm not kidding. I was stunned.

In addition, while I was working in the tissue culture room today somebody asked me, "Est-ce que tue connais où est la pchit-pchit?" (translation: do you know where the pchit-pchit is?) I had to ask Frank to repeat what he was saying like four times before I finally got it. The "pchit-pchit" is a spray bottle (we use it to spray on things to make it sterile in the lab)--named for the sound it makes when it sprays. Frank used the word "onomatopée" (virtually the same as the English "onomatopoeia") to get his point across.