I was reading one of my favorite blogs last night when the author said she didn't know where the expression “pull yourself up by your bootstraps” came from. So I decided I would write an article about these obscure little pieces of verbal bricabrack.
I know the bootstrap saying because my parents were very demonstrative. I saw my dad pulling his bootstraps daily. Boots were made, and many still are, with a small strap at the top of them to make it easier to pull them up. There would be days that cowboys were so tired they would grab the straps on their boots to lift their legs off of the edge of their bunks to start another day. There are dozens of origin stories to this expression, but this is the one that I grew up with, and frankly it seems more plausible than the ones that say it means to literally lift oneself all of the way off the ground by nothing but their bootstraps. Here are a few others that I know.
Redneck - The world has an image of a redneck thanks to Jeff Foxworthy, but not many know where the term comes from. Redneck comes from the sunburn on the back on the neck from long days of hard outdoor labor
As Mad as a Hatter – No, this didn't start with Alice in Wonderland, the expression came first. This expression is used to describe utter insanity. Mercury used to be used to soften rabbit fur of felt hats, so hatters, or hat makers, would come into contact with this poisonous metal a lot. It was common for hat makers, or hatters, to develop mercury poisoning and becoming “mad”.
Make No Bones about it – This has to do with making soup! When you 'make no bones' about something, you tell somebody the blunt truth making it 'easier to swallow'. When bones are left out of soup, or removed, it is of a consistency that makes it 'easier to swallow'.
And for those of you that get your soup from a can, bones are often added to soup to give flavoring. The cook stews the marrow out of the bone to give soup a meatier flavor. It's just not in your canned soup.
What expressions have you heard that you would like to know where they came from? Share them and I'll see if I can come up with it! =D
Woo Hoo!! There I am. All quite interesting. I love this type of information. And it's information I can remember. I can't remember where my car keys are and I usually don't pay attention in meetings and I haven't memorized my spawns social security numbers..but I will remember why a hatter is mad. :)
ReplyDeleteThanks, by the way.
You gave me the nugget to start today's blog! =D
ReplyDeleteThere are so many phrases and sayings it was hard to pick just a few to go over.