Language meanings

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codgerbill said:
The navy term for a place that served ice cream or sweets on the ship was called a "ge-dunk..I wonder where that came from?

Don't know where the term "ge-dunk" came from, but when I was in the Navy, during Viet Nam, everyone who served at least 90 days got the "National Service Medal."  I think it is awarded to anyone who serves during a time when the U.S. is involved in an armed conflict. Anyway, we always called it our "ge-dunk" medal, I suppose because you really didn't have to do anything to earn it, except show up for work, and it was as common as anything you could buy at the "ge-dunk."
 
dont forget Holiday Routine or Holiday Rooty Tooty , Steel Beach , turn to , knock off , and Liberty Call ..

Yankee Station and Gonzo Station
 
So it must have been my Army Air Corps father that I got the term "Ditty Bag" from.  I drive friends and family crazy when I talk about always having a ditty bag ready for last minute/emergency travel.  When I needed a new one I finally got the salesman to understand when I tried "toiletry bag".
And my son wrote often about the steel beach picnics they would have on board his destroyer...and one of his proudest moments was becoming a "shell-back"!!
 
I didn't mean to offend anyone with my remark about spell check.  And, it wasn't meant for "slang" terms, those I get.  It's for the obvious misspellings that get to me.  Guess working with school's has made me look at everything I write and when I make a "mistype" I am really upset with myself.  So, I apologize if I offended anyone with the spell check remark, I was just stating an observation.
 
4ducks ~~    No offense here ~ Just my opinion

I read & reread what I post and then reread again.  Yup ! Sometimes something sneaks by and am surprised :eek: :eek: by what I wrote ~~I hit 'edit' before I embarrass myself.  :-[ (Hoping I am the 1st one to see it.)  I also keep a dictonary on my desk and refer to it often. I do agree there is a difference between slang and gross carelessness.  Some folk speak in regional idioms  and do a great job of being understood.  Some just don't care ~or think 'text' speak is cool.

"SpellCheck" just is not my cup of tea (neither is having a typist correct my letter to her vision of correctness completely altering the content).  I have read/heard horror stories regarding the 'text'checker "AutoCorrect" on some(?) cell phones - that anticipates the word intended with some VERY surprising results.  Not something I want  ~~ seems invasive.  JM2?
 
The spell checker in Firefox (and most other browsers) works very simply.  If a word is misspelled, it's underlined in red.  You can a) ignore it, b) right click and select the correct spelling from a list, or c) add it to the dictionary if it's actually spelled correctly.  I, too, don't like auto-correct.
 
I kind of started this volley when I threw up all over the non-word "prolly".  (I even had trouble typing it just now)

I like idioms, chichis and colloquialisms as much as the next person.  What I don't have an appreciation for, or patience with, is arrogant ignorance or the flaunting of one's right of self expression, at the expense of causing me to have to guess at an interpretation of what the hell a person is trying to say.

Total disregard of proper punctuation is another of my "peeves".  (another thread, I know..) 

I realize we don't speak in Capital Letters, commas, periods and question marks, but we need to understand that if our writing is going to be understood and well received by the reader, we might best limit our unconventional, but self satisfying, writing styles.

I do use spell check. (It finds many finger checks as well as embarrassing misspellings)

I do not like type ahead or auto-correct.

Edited to correct spelling and punctuation errors. ;) :D
 
Amen, Porky.  Speaking is one thing.  Writing is another.  Taking common shortcuts when writing isn't (<< common shortcut) a bad thing.  But what gets my goat is taking shortcuts as though one is sending a 140 character max (<< another common shortcut) text message when one has plenty of time & (<< another common shortcut) space.

Huh!  Remember that one?  "The thing that really gets my goat is that the pants wear out before the coat".
 
4ducksrus said:
Margi,
California used to have a lot of Prune Orchards and so that's where the Prune Picker came from.  I'm sure a lot of us "older" Californians will remember cutting cots.  That's something I remember doing as a small child while visiting relatives in Delano, CA.  As for Language and meanings...My grandma always said, "lord willing and the crick don't rise"  Whatever that meant, was her way of saying she'd get to it if she could!!

FroM Wiki    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_whole_nine_yards

A vast number of explanations for this phrase have been suggested.[2][3][4] The most common explanation is that World War II (1939-1945) gunners would supposedly "go the full nine yards" by firing an aircraft's entire ammunition belt at the enemy, the belt supposedly being nine yards long.[nb 1][4] But ammunition is normally measured in rounds,[nb 2] rarely in terms of physical belt length.[2] Moreover, this explanation does not appear in print until 40 years after the war.[5] No examples of the phrase from the World War II era have been found, despite extensive searches.[nb 3][2] There are many versions of this explanation with variations regarding type of plane, nationality of gunner, and geographic area. Another common explanation is that "nine yards" is a cubic measure and refers to the volume of a cement mixer.[6] But cement mixers were much smaller in the 1960s and none of the early references relate to cement or even to construction.[7] Other proposed sources include the volume of graves;[8] the length of bridal veils, kilts, burial shrouds, bolts of cloth,[9] or saris; American football; ritual disembowelment; shipyards; and the structure of certain sailing vessels.[10] Little documentary evidence has surfaced to support any of these explanations.[11]


PHE
 
falconhunter said:
Not really a north or south phrase but my father told me the term ?the whole nine yards? was actually an air force term.  The length of a belt of ammo on a spitfire  50 cal. machine gun was nine yards long so when you gave someone the whole nine yards you emptied your machine gun on them.


From WiKi    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_whole_nine_yards

A vast number of explanations for this phrase have been suggested.[2][3][4] The most common explanation is that World War II (1939-1945) gunners would supposedly "go the full nine yards" by firing an aircraft's entire ammunition belt at the enemy, the belt supposedly being nine yards long.[nb 1][4] But ammunition is normally measured in rounds,[nb 2] rarely in terms of physical belt length.[2] Moreover, this explanation does not appear in print until 40 years after the war.[5] No examples of the phrase from the World War II era have been found, despite extensive searches.[nb 3][2] There are many versions of this explanation with variations regarding type of plane, nationality of gunner, and geographic area. Another common explanation is that "nine yards" is a cubic measure and refers to the volume of a cement mixer.[6] But cement mixers were much smaller in the 1960s and none of the early references relate to cement or even to construction.[7] Other proposed sources include the volume of graves;[8] the length of bridal veils, kilts, burial shrouds, bolts of cloth,[9] or saris; American football; ritual disembowelment; shipyards; and the structure of certain sailing vessels.[10] Little documentary evidence has surfaced to support any of these explanations.[11]

U.S. Navy Captain Richard A. Stratton later recalled that the phrase was the punchline of a dirty joke he had heard while attending flight school in Pensacola, Florida in 1955.[nb 4][12] In the first printed reference, a short story published in 1962, the phrase is attributed to "a brush salesman."[13] A letter published in an auto magazine later that year describes a certain new car as containing "all nine yards of goodies".[14] In 1964, several newspapers published a syndicated story which explained that, "Give 'em the whole nine yards" was NASA talk for an item-by-item report.[15] In this early usage, the emphasis is on length rather than completeness.[16]
 
Many years ago when I was "raised up" in one of the many "hollers" of WV, the expression,"the good lord willing and the creek don't raise", actually referred to the creek rising enough that you could not cross it. Many of the roads up the hollows followed the creek. In places the road would have to cross the creek,(called a ford), in order to have enough level land to have a road bed. We were too poor to have bridges back then. This was across the larger creeks. The smaller ones sometimes just had a foot log.

If the water rose high enough, the horses and wagons could not cross. There are still some places in western Virginia, WV and Kentucky that this is an accepted way to get up the hollow.

Another saying was,"I got my tongue tangled up with my eye tooth and couldn't see what I was saying".

Jerry Groah
 
Jerry, my last trip up I77, through WV, I noticed that the highway crossed Paint Creek seven times in less than four miles.  I'm sure locally, that's known as "Pint Crick".

I recall when they put that thar 57 hi'way thru grandaddy's farm.  They done ruint the whole durn thang, 'cuz they up and took five'a his seven acres.  They had to put a bridge 'cross the holler.  I 'member them a'asken grandaddy if that stream had a name, he told 'um, "we jus call it the crick".  When they finished up, they put up a sign, CRICK CREEK.  Grandaddy took one look at that sign and said, "I reckon it 'autta be 'tuther way 'round."
 
When I was growing up the warning lights on the car's dashboard were called "idiot lights".  To this day I have to make an effort not to refer to them by that name but for
the longest time I really thought that was the correct name.  The sad part is that my sister actually said that the oil light never came on when she found out there were no oil in the engine and the car would not start.

Another saying I grew up with is "Knee high to a grasshopper".  Now if I used that one referring to when I was a small child I get strange looks.
 
Terier said:
When I was growing up the warning lights on the car's dashboard were called "idiot lights".
Warning lights?  What warning lights?  Our dash did have some dim lights that came on when you turned on the headlights, but no warning lights.  Guess my folks of generation weren't idiots, huh?  But, automobiles did bring along some new words to munch on such as "Fire-Dome V8", "Hydrostatic transmission", "Rocket 88", "rumble seat"...Oh dear.  This maybe should be a whole new thread.
 
DH was talking to my son this morning (who is putting in 13 - 14 hours a day at work) and I overheard him say "You're working from 'can see to can't see'."
And that reminded me of being so hungry my stomach thought my throat was cut......... ::)
 

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