My old Man used to have a lot of funny sayings and one in particular I could never figure out where he got it.
Now I know.
#5
Except he always used to say that he got drunker than a piss boiled owl.
I always wondered where in the hell he got that from and now I know that it was probably handed down through the men in the family from the Victorian Age and it just got a little twist to it over time.
Ya learn the strangest shit surfing the net sometimes but somehow I feel better knowing that now.
I’ve actually encountered #1 in the wild, the rest are all new to me.
#8 is easy enough to understand
#2 is brilliant & I’m going to use that on the dear wife from now on!
The language of old had a quality that very few appreciate today, that’s some amusing stuff.
My Dad’s Uncle, would complain of something poor quality, not being worth a “Crock of Sour Owl Shit”.
He was 6’4″, and had a voice like a bulldozer in low gear. I’m glad I got to know him.
The English call getting drunk, pissed. I’ve also heard boiled used like that. So I guess it’s stoopid drunk.
Neat info.
Well, we’re now ALL better off for knowing, Phil!!
The things you stumble across…
‘Pissed as a parrot!’, when lorikeets and rosellas etc find a flowering tree with fermented nectar, well it’s on for young and old. Quite amusing, they’ll fall off their perch, have a stoush with others, then huddle, saying the avian equivalant of “mate, mate, ma-ate, I’m sorry mate”.
One time I accidentally shot an owl. I say “accidentially” but I pointed a 12 guage at him and pulled the trigger so I guess it was on purpose. More of a case of midsidentification. Long story but I did not at the time consider the idea of boiling said owl in order to better understand the metaphor, or simile, or whatever. I need a drink.
My Dad’s weird saying was “What do you want in a $7.00 suit of clothes? Hummingbirds?
My old man had a raft of those sorts of sayings, most of them of barnyard origins: “Raining like a cow on a flat rock”, “Worthless as tits on a boar hog”, etc.
It’s also worth remembering that the Brits do speak a different language: “Me fliver was pranged in the boot by a lorry”.
Even the language of such American authors as Mark Twain and Jack London sounds quaint and funny to us now.
I’ve said on mine, GranMaw used to say “Deader n’Kelsey’s Nuts” back in the day… took me forever to figure that one out… you can Google it…
Hum, in my family (from SW England 3 generations back) #4 meant preggers here in U.S. = knocked up.
Here in the southern Appalachians one will hear words/phrases not heard anywhere else.
“tight as Dick’s hatband”
“Katy bar the door”
One of my favorites refers to something that has spoiled (i.e. “that meat is karned” or “something smells karney” and sometimes “those mashed potatoes have karned over”. The word finds it’s origins in the middle English (KJV of the Bible referring to Carrion Crows).