Sayings you just don't understand...

[equality72521]

phu(k me running.

[imcarthur]

And Bob's your uncle.

Ian

btw The only ducks that I ever shot duck hunting in my youth were 2 with one shot . . . 2 birds with one stone in reality . . .

[Stephen 325TDS]

http://www.localhistories.org/sayings.html

[Taz's Master]

I could care less.

The reason you can care less is because it is important to you, when something doesn't matter, then you COULDN'T care less.

[URY914]

"WhatEVER......"

[legion]

"My bad..."

How does a sentence fragment consisting of a pronoun and an adjective even make sense?

[masraum]

THis is a good site for that sort of thing, although it doesn't really have a good origin for either.

http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/index.html

SKIN THE CAT - According to Charles Earle Funk in "A Hog on Ice" (Harper & Row, New York, 1948) the expression "to skin the cat" refers to a boy's gymnastic trick: "In America, as any country boy knows, this means to hang by the hands from a branch or bar, draw the legs up through the arms and over the branch, and pull oneself up into a sitting position. As we must abide by the record, we cannot say positively that the name for this violent small-boy exercise is more than a century old, but it is highly likely that Ben Franklin or earlier American lads had the same name for it. No one got around to putting it into print until about 1845. One can't be sure why the operation was called 'skinning the cat,' but maybe some mother, seeing it for the first time, saw in it some resemblance to the physical operation of removing the pelt from a cat, first from the forelegs and down over the body." Mr. Funk doesn't say WHY anyone would actually skin a cat, but anyway.

"Random House Dictionary of Popular Proverbs and Sayings" by Gregory Y. Titelman (Random House, New York, 1996) lists the expression "more than one way to skin a cat" but doesn't really address the origin. Mr. Titelman does say it dates back to the 1678: "MORE THAN ONE WAY TO SKIN A CAT --There are many ways to do something. The proverb appeared in John Ray's collection of English proverbs in 1678, and is first attested in the United States in 'John Smith's Letters' (1839). 'There are more ways to kill a cat besides choking him to death' is a variant of the saying. The words 'with butter' or 'on cream' may replace the words 'to death' in the latter version."

Another possibility

I can offer a whole new spin on this particular phrase. I am from the Mississipp Delta, where catfish is a staple of our diet (or at least it was). Catfish have to be skinned when they are cleaned, unlike all other fish there which must be scaled. Since everyone catches and cleans their own fish, everyone has their own way to skin the catfish, hence the phrase "more than one way to skin a cat." They are talking about catfish, not cats. As a side note, if you were ever to run across someone fishing out of the river or one of the many waterways we have there and ask them if they had caught anything , their answer, (if they had caught some catfish) would typically be, "yeah a couple of cat", meaning , of course, catfish.

KILL TWO BIRDS WITH ONE STONE - "Achieve two objectives with a single effort. It would be remarkable indeed if someone slinging a stone at a bird got one bird, let alone two. Ovid had a similar expression in L*tin nearly 2,000 years ago. Related phrases were in English and French literature by the 16th century. Thomas Hobbes used the modern version in a work on liberty in 1656: 'T. H. thinks to kill two birds with one stone, and satisfy two arguments with one answer.'" "Dictionary of Cliches" by James Rogers (Wings Books, Originally New York: Facts on File Publications, 1985).

[id10t]

2 birds 1 stone - I've gotten a double on skeet targets more than once... stations 1,2,6,7 all have a double shot. With a really open choke (none), time it right and you can break both birds wiht one shot.

Also, if you look on forums.gunbroker.com now, there is a recent (2 or 3 days ago) thread about a guy who "hunts" over bait (legal where he is). 2 deer with one shot (using a 338 lapua - over penetration!), 3 deer with a second.

[ckissick]

"I tell ya, if it was an inch, it was a mile"

That makes no sense at all.

[Mo_Gearhead]

"I'm from the Government and I'm here to help."

[KevinP73]

"In happiness and in health 'till death do you part"............just threw up in my mouth a little.

[Zeke]

"Well, no, yes." How many do you know that can start a sentence with that?

Almost all sayings have an interesting beginning. The slang of the beat and hip out of the 30's and 40's can be the most obscure, but eventually figured out.

Here's one from "Shake, Rattle and Roll," "I'm like a one-eyed cat, peepin' in a sea-food store" I can tell you that if the censors from the AM radio days had that one nailed, it would never have been played. When Bill Haley and The Comets recorded Big Joe Turner's song after "Rock Around the Clock," it segued right into the mainstream completely under the radar!

I have a collection of Southern sayings that I wrote down as I heard them fist hand. Here's one, "My head feels like it's full of stump water and wiggletails." Another, "If the mule's in the ditch, you better get him out."

[rattlsnak]

LOL, i just bought a book for my brother in law that is basically a book full of redneck sayings. Freaking hilarious, and it took some time to figure out some of them, and some i never did quite understand. Its wrapped now, but after he opens it, ill post some.

and most overused one is of course,. 'the whole nine yards'... Many people have no clue where that came from.

[cgarr]

axe


So I am cutting fire wood this weekend, went into the store and wanted to know where the asks were?

[KevinP73]

I recently heard an explanation of the expression "balls out" or "balls to the wall". The governors on steam engines utilized a centrifugal device comprised of two rotating arms weighted by balls. As the engines rpm increased the centrifugal force would force the balls apart and thru a mechanical link would open a pressure release valve. At maximum rpm the balls would be at the limit of their travel or "balls out".

[Schumi]

"Irregardless"

is just wrong, but I heard people say it all the time. What they mean is 'regardless' meaning 'not having any regard'. Irregardless would mean, on the contrary, having regard.

[trekkor]

'the whole nine yards'

Didn't that have to do with belt-fed ammo? ( length of )


I don't like it when someone says to me in answer to: "How are you?"

"Fair to middlin' ". (?!?)


Yes, 'my bad'... I meaningless or sarcastic "I'm sorry" that carries no weight.
I almost fired a guy over that...



KT

[peppy]

I love these sayings, I don't get some of them, but I like em.

Lucky as a dog with two pe*&ers.

Hard as woodpecker lips.

That's as messed up as a soup samich.

[cgarr]

As useless as screen doors on a submarine.

[gprsh924]

I guess understand this one but I am curious to the orgins... "If your sister had a dick she'd be your brother"