‘London to a brick’: meanings and origin

3rd Jun 2021.Reading time 12 minutes.

Australia, 1909—(horseracing) a bet is sure to pay off; (in extended use) something is a very strong probability—from the notion that the punter is so confident of winning the bet that he is prepared to put the whole city of London on a horse to win a brick, i.e., a ten-pound note

‘champagne socialist’: meanings and early occurrences

18th Apr 2021.Reading time 14 minutes.

USA, 1906: a person who advocates equality for all people at a high level of prosperity (i.e., who believes in champagne for everybody)—UK, 1956: a person who espouses socialist ideals while enjoying a wealthy lifestyle

‘to name and shame’: meaning and early occurrences

7th Apr 2021.Reading time 10 minutes.

Canada and UK, 1978—to publicly disclose perceived wrongdoing or failure on the part of a person or institution; to expose private behaviour to public censure—earlier longer phrases include ‘blame’

‘neighbour(s) from hell’: meaning and early occurrences

31st Mar 2021.Reading time 11 minutes.

UK, 1993—USA, 1987—the words ‘—— from hell’ are suffixed to nouns often referring to everyday life, such as ‘holidays’ and ‘neighbour(s)’, to make phrases denoting an exceptionally unpleasant or bad example or instance of ‘——’

‘the order of the boot’: meaning and origin

30th Mar 2021.Reading time 14 minutes.

dismissal from employment—UK, 1882, as ‘the noble order of the boot’—‘the boot’ refers to kicking somebody out—the phrase puns on two acceptations of ‘order’: an authoritative command and an institution founded for the purpose of honouring meritorious conduct

notes on the phrase ‘sing ’em muck’

21st Feb 2021.Reading time 17 minutes.

1928 in Clara Butt: Her Life-Story, by H. W. Ponder—“Sing ’em muck! It’s all they can understand!”: advice given by Australian soprano Nellie Melba to English contralto Clara Butt, who was about to undertake a tour of Australia

‘to be able to talk under water (under wet cement/concrete)’

20th Feb 2021.Reading time 7 minutes.

Australia—to have the gift of the gab—‘to be able to talk under water’ (1951)—‘to be able to talk under wet cement’ (1978)—‘to be able to talk under wet concrete’ (1980)

‘wouldn’t work in an iron lung’: meaning and origin

19th Feb 2021.Reading time 8 minutes.

Australia, 1953—used of an extremely lazy person—refers to the artificial respirator that kept polio patients alive by “breathing” for them

‘the politics of the warm inner glow’: meaning and origin

17th Feb 2021.Reading time 7 minutes.

Australia, 1981—the ideology of the Australian Labor Party’s left wing, “for whom the ultimate test of a policy is the feeling of personal virtuousness to be derived from its espousal”—Labor politician James McClelland claimed to have coined this phrase

‘better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick’

14th Feb 2021.Reading time 11 minutes.

British and Irish English, 1833—denotes qualified pleasure—also: ‘to give [someone] a poke in the eye (with a — stick)’, meaning to deprecate [someone]—from ‘a poke in the eye’, denoting something undesirable

word histories

Category: Australia & New Zealand