I find Scandinavians are much better English speakers than they give themselves credit for (they are sometimes deeply apologetic about immaculate English). Idioms, however, are the hardest part about any language and in English they are hard to nail without painstaking dedication to that language, to the exclusion of native speech in other languages. And that's how you get idioms like pull request, or Ace of Base "All that she wants / is another baby". The latter is supposed to mean "another lover" but it conveys "another pregnancy".
Linus and I are equally Scandinavian, so please let me take this and run with it: The one brief, shining splitsecond of my life where I may actually have perceived something clearer than he did.
You are right, of course. Idioms are eminently slip-upable, especially - I would guess - for someone coming from a closely related language with many fixed expressions beguilingly close, just not quite as close as they may sound on first hearing.
