“ad fontes!”
UK, 1866—used as an observation, a reproof or a warning implying over-cleverness—plays on two meanings of the adjective ‘sharp’: a) literal meaning: ‘cutting’; b) figurative meaning: ‘keen-witted’
Read Morediarrhoea suffered by travellers, especially in Egypt—USA, 1973—does not seem to have been coined after the synonymous ‘Montezuma’s Revenge’—may somehow allude to the legendary curse of the pharaohs
Read Moreto vomit, especially from drunkenness—slang, obsolete—1609 as ‘to jerk the cat’—perhaps alludes to the fact that cats are prone to vomit—cf. also the obsolete French verb ‘renarder’, to vomit, from the noun ‘renard’, denoting a fox
Read MoreUK, 1972—the nouns ‘granny-bashing’ and ‘granny-battering’ denote: a) the assault or mugging of elderly persons; b) abuse of an elderly member of one’s family, especially one’s grandmother
Read Moreleft-handed: ‘molly-handed’, ‘mauldy’, ‘molly-dooked’—a left-handed person: ‘molly-hander’, ‘mauldy’, ‘molly-dook’—‘molly’ and ‘mauldy’ may derive from ‘mauley’, denoting the hand or fist; ‘dook’ is ‘duke’, denoting the hand or fist
Read MoreUSA, 1957, teenagers’ slang—to worry about trivial, insignificant matters—usually as ‘don’t sweat the small stuff’, said as reproof or consolation
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UK, 1917—used when one cannot think of, or does not wish to use, the name of a thing; by extension, a useful implement, a gadget—origin unknown
Read Morealso ‘Christmas grip’—Australia, prison slang, 1953—a grabbing of another’s testicles—the image is of a handful of nuts
Read MoreAustralia, 1954—extremely ugly; extremely tired—the noun ‘sandshoe’ denotes a light canvas shoe with a rubber sole
Read MoreUK, 1872—humorous—to obstruct a person’s view—chiefly used in ‘you make a better door than (a) window’, addressed to one who obstructs the speaker’s view
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word histories 