‘jam butty’ (police patrol car)
UK, 1971—‘jam butty’ (also ‘jam sandwich’): a colloquial appellation for a police patrol car having a red stripe painted on a white background
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a grim phrase: ‘churchyard luck’
In Britain in the 19th and early 20th centuries, the grim proletarian phrase ‘churchyard luck’ denoted the ‘good fortune’ which the parents of a large, poor family experienced by the death of one or more of their children.
Read More‘a sniff of the barmaid’s apron’: meaning and origin
UK, 1929—a drink of alcohol—especially used of an initial drink taken by someone (e.g. a young person) who is particularly susceptible to the effects of alcohol
Read More‘until Nelson gets his eye back’: meaning and origin
UK and Ireland—with reference to the fact that Horatio Nelson was blinded in one eye—(1922) ‘until/when Nelson gets his eye back’ is used of a very long time in the future—(1933) the metaphor of Nelson getting his eye back is used of a very small chance of success
Read More‘every Preston Guild’: meaning and origin
UK, 1892—very rarely—refers to the fact that Preston Guilds are held only once every twenty years—Preston is the administrative centre of Lancashire, a county of north-western England, on the Irish Sea
Read More‘Queen Anne front and Mary Ann back’
UK and USA, 1889—used of anything that is speciously high-class in appearance, but is commonplace in reality—‘Queen Anne’ means ‘beautiful’, as opposed to ‘Mary Ann’, meaning ‘vile’; ‘low’; ‘mean’
Read More‘three on the hook and three on the book’
interwar period—Liverpudlian dockers—three days at work and three days on the dole—‘hook’ refers to the dockers’ tool, ‘book’ refers to the unemployment register
Read More‘alcoholiday’: meaning and origin
UK, 1877—humorous: a holiday or period of leisure spent drinking alcoholic liquor—blend of the nouns ‘alcohol’ and ‘holiday’—has, in the course of time, been coined on separate occasions by various persons, independently from one another
Read More‘queue-jump’, ‘to jump the queue’: meanings and early occurrences
UK, 1920 (‘queue-jumper’)—literally: to push forward out of turn in a queue—figuratively: to obtain unfair priority over others—especially used since the 1930s in relation to compulsory queueing schemes implemented by public-transport authorities
Read Morenotes on ‘Chief Mouser to the Cabinet Office’
UK, 1997—the title given to the official resident cat of the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom at 10 Downing Street, London—‘mouser’, first recorded circa 1440, denotes an animal that catches mice
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word histories 