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Post by onlymark on Sept 17, 2012 8:04:04 GMT
Semi-permanent.
Surely it's a bit like saying semi-infinity. If you halve infinity it's still infinity. If something is permanent then half of that will still be permanent.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 17, 2012 9:23:50 GMT
I am wondering what dibs are.
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Post by onlymark on Sept 17, 2012 10:35:09 GMT
Whatever it is, it's mine first.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 17, 2012 10:37:11 GMT
Yes, but what are they?
Origin of DIBS
short for dibstones jacks, from obsolete dib to dab First Known Use: 1812
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Post by Deleted on Jan 24, 2013 18:35:35 GMT
I don't know what this means: People don’t seem to take on board the fact they breed at the rate of knots.It was in this article.
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Post by onlymark on Jan 24, 2013 18:53:49 GMT
People don't seem to understand that they reproduce very quickly.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 24, 2013 19:10:11 GMT
Knots?
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Post by mossie on Jan 24, 2013 19:25:25 GMT
1 knot = 1 nautical mile per hour, hence a measurement of speed. Originates in old nautical practice, a log was tied to a long length of string which had knots in it at regular intervals. The log was chucked overboard and the number of knots drawn out in a set period of time measured the speed of the boat. When aeroplanes were invented this method proved dangerous and more sophisticated methods of counting the "rate of knots" had to be developed.
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Post by bixaorellana on Jan 24, 2013 19:43:28 GMT
When aeroplanes were invented this method proved dangerous *SNORK!*
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Post by mossie on Jan 25, 2013 8:12:40 GMT
Because one of the educated members of the crew had measured out the cord to tie the knots at the right intervals, the log was precious and had to be hauled back in to be reused. This is the origin of the term "ships log"
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Post by bixaorellana on Jan 25, 2013 8:49:09 GMT
I always fall for statements like the above, but I'm simply not going to this time. So there.
(does this mean I'm growing up?)
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Post by mossie on Jan 25, 2013 14:41:54 GMT
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Post by bjd on Jan 26, 2013 19:17:49 GMT
Bixa mentioned a "blue plate special" in her Puebla thread. Why a blue plate?
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Post by Deleted on Jan 26, 2013 19:40:07 GMT
Good question, but that is the traditional name of the "special of the day" in the United States.
Here is part of the history of the blue place special:
The term became common starting in the late 1920s. A May 27, 1926 advertisement in The New York Times for "The Famous Old Sea Grill Lobster and Chop House" at 141 West 45th Street promises "A La Carte All Hours", "Moderate Prices", and "Blue Plate Specials". A December 2, 1928 article, lamenting the rise in prices that has made it difficult to "dine on a dime", praises an Ann Street establishment where you can still get "a steak-and-lots-of-onion sandwich for a dime and a "big blue-plate special, with meat course and three vegetables, is purchasable for a quarter, just as it has been for the last ten years." The first book publication of Damon Runyon's story, "Little Miss Marker," was in a 1934 collection entitled Damon Runyon's Blue Plate Special. A Hollywood columnist wrote in 1940, "Every time Spencer Tracy enters the Metro commissary, executives and minor geniuses look up from their blue plate specials to look at the actor and marvel." In the 1953 The Honeymooners episode "Suspense," Ralph, suspecting that Alice plans to murder him with a carving knife, says to Norton, "Did you hear that, pal? She wants to borrow a carving knife. I never thought I'd end up a blue-plate special."
"No substitutions" was a common policy on blue-plate specials. One 1947 Candid Microphone episode features Allen Funt ordering a blue-plate special and trying to talk the waiter into making various changes, such as replacing the vegetable soup with consommé, while the polite but increasingly annoyed waiter tries in vain to explain to Funt that "no substitutions" means what it says. Our Man in Havana (1958) by Graham Greene has the following exchange regarding an "American blue-plate lunch":
"Surely you know what a blue-plate is, man? They shove the whole meal at you under your nose, already dished up on your plate -roast turkey, cranberry sauce, sausages and carrots and French Fried. I can't bear French fried but there's no pick and choose with a blue-plate." "No pick and choose?" "You eat what you're given. That's democracy, man."
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Post by Deleted on Feb 5, 2014 19:49:29 GMT
God, I hate thinking of a mysterious term during the day and thinking "I must immediately post something about it when I get home" -- and now of course I do not have the slightest idea what expression I was thinking of.
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Post by kerouac2 on Jun 28, 2020 15:21:31 GMT
I understand this expression, but I heard it for the first time today on the BBC: "as fit as a butcher's dog."
They were talking about Boris Johnson's self evaluation for health.
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Post by lagatta on Jun 28, 2020 22:40:55 GMT
Well, obviously, a butcher's dog (or cat) would have an ample supply of fresh meat scraps.
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Post by patricklondon on Jun 29, 2020 4:14:45 GMT
There is, or was for a time, a tinned dogfood sold under the brand name Butcher's that used it as their marketibg slogan. By contrast, there's the rarer and more negative "barber's cat", which turns up occasionally in various derogatory ways of indicating someone weak or sickly-looking or more prone to complaining rather than doing (maybe because a barber's cat might be coughing up hairballs all the time?) My blog | My photos | My video clips | My Librivox recordings"too literate to be spam"
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Post by onlyMark on Aug 25, 2020 19:49:14 GMT
The origin of these phrases:-
1. In the 1400s a law was set forth in England that a man was allowed to beat his wife with a stick no thicker than his thumb. Hence we have 'the rule of thumb.'
2. Many years ago in Scotland , a new game was invented. It was ruled 'Gentlemen Only... Ladies Forbidden'... and thus the word GOLF entered into the English language.
3. Each king in a deck of playing cards represents a great king from history: Spades - King David, Hearts - Charlemagne, Clubs -Alexander the Great, Diamonds - Julius Caesar.
4. In Shakespeare's time, mattresses were secured on bed frames by ropes. When you pulled on the ropes the mattress tightened, making the bed firmer to sleep on. Hence the phrase......... 'goodnight, sleep tight.'
5. It was the accepted practice in Babylon 4,000 years ago that for a month after the wedding, the bride's father would supply his son-in-law with all the mead he could drink. Mead is a honey beer and because their calendar was lunar based, this period was called the honey month, which we know today as the honeymoon.
6. In English pubs, ale is ordered by pints and quarts... So in old England , when customers got unruly, the bartender would yell at them 'Mind your pints and quarts, and settle down.' It's where we get the phrase 'mind your P's and Q's'
7. Many years ago in England, pub frequenters had a whistle baked into the rim or handle of their ceramic cups. When they needed a refill, they used the whistle to get some service. 'Wet your whistle' is the phrase inspired by this practice.
8. In 1696, William III of England introduced a property tax that required those living in houses with more than six windows to pay a levy. In order to avoid the tax, house owners would brick up all windows except six. (The Window Tax lasted until 1851, and older houses with bricked-up windows are still a common sight in the U.K.) As the bricked-up windows prevented some rooms from receiving any sunlight, the tax was referred to as “daylight robbery”.
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Post by kerouac2 on Aug 25, 2020 20:03:08 GMT
Very interesting factoids. I would have never guessed "daylight robbery."
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Post by bixaorellana on Aug 25, 2020 21:36:56 GMT
Interesting, although I doubt the accuracy of some of them.
The rule of thumb for instance, I think is derived from using the span from one knuckle to another on the thumb as a measure of one inch. Since this span would vary from person to person, the "rule of thumb" means something like the rough or general idea of something.
Both wet your whistle and daylight robbery could just as easily be colorful ways to describe those actions -- we whistle with our lips and stealing in plain sight, for instance how politicians do it, would be daylight robbery.
Here is an expression I have used, but don't know the origin of it. I used it recently talking to someone I know & she said she never heard it nor knew what it meant: "Hell bent for leather".
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Post by onlyMark on Aug 25, 2020 21:45:44 GMT
I doubt the accuracy as well, but entertaining anyway. "Hell bent for leather" not to be confused with "hell for leather".
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Post by questa on Aug 26, 2020 0:36:54 GMT
6. In English pubs, ale is ordered by pints and quarts... So in old England , when customers got unruly, the bartender would yell at them 'Mind your pints and quarts, and settle down.' It's where we get the phrase 'mind your P's and Q's'
I was told that it goes back to when printing books, newspapers etc was done by typesetters who arranged each letter in it's place and back to front for printing. The easiest letters to mix up were the 'p' and 'q' leading to the expression which gives the listener a warning to be careful
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Post by onlyMark on Aug 26, 2020 6:09:22 GMT
That seems a more logical reason.
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Post by questa on Aug 26, 2020 14:32:26 GMT
I get the feeling that some of these are contrived... Origin of Golf Words and Terms. One of the questions I am often asked is whether the word GOLF is a an acronym for Gentlemen Only Ladies Forbidden. It is not.
'Hell bent'implies determined to have or do something possibility dangerous or unwise. "he was hell bent on getting a motorbike when he turned 16" Then hell for leather came along implying a horse being ridden fast so that the saddle etc got damaged. As there was a fast/dangerous element in both sayings, they became as one in common use, and it sounded better. That's my story and I'm sticken to it!
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Post by kerouac2 on Aug 26, 2020 15:05:54 GMT
My favorites have always been "How do you do?" and the French counterpart "Comment allez-vous?" which were questions from intestinal troubled times about whether you were shitting well. (Does this question exist in other languages?)
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Post by bixaorellana on Aug 26, 2020 16:05:46 GMT
I question whether those phrases were originally about pooping.
Como estás? / Como está usted? translate to "how are you?" in English. I believe an archaic form of "How do you do?" was "How do you?", which would be the equivalent of "How are things?"
Then there is the confusing-to-an-American friendly UK greeting of "Are you all right?"
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Post by questa on Aug 27, 2020 7:32:08 GMT
Indonesian...Apa kabar = what news... used any time. Late afternoon the people have their 2nd shower for the day then a meal of rice. Then they go socialising. Then the greeting is "Sudah mandi?" = "Have you showered yet" or "Sudah makan nasi?" "Have you eaten rice yet?" (as opposed to a packet of chips etc.)
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Post by patricklondon on Aug 27, 2020 13:43:17 GMT
I question whether those phrases were originally about pooping. Me too. I think it would be an old way of asking about one's general sense of health. Then there is the confusing-to-an-American friendly UK greeting of "Are you all right?" As a generic greeting, it's usually a (alightly mumbled) "awright?*" If someone spelt out the whole phrase, I'd understand it as indicating I was looking unwell or unhappy. * as in My blog | My photos | My video clips | My Librivox recordings"too literate to be spam"
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Post by onlyMark on Aug 27, 2020 15:03:51 GMT
Say 'ayup, orryte' to Cheery. What will she reply? Maybe, 'Am orryte'? Or maybe, 'middlin'?
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