Origins

In response to a diminishing number of requests, what follow is (drum roll) useless information:

“Know the ropes” – sailors had to learn which rope raised and lowered which sail

 “Out of Sorts” – printers used to have to set type one letter at a time. The letters were stored in wooden boxes, one box per character and per size. When a letter was in the wrong box, it was “out of sorts.”

“86 it” – Now meaning to throw out or trash, originally from Chumley’s Bar in Greenwich Village. Chumley’s was a popular literary gathering spot for the Village intelligencia. Literary types including John Steinbeck, Ernest Hemingway, Edna Ferber, Simone de Beauvoir, and Jack Kerouac were known to raise a glass there.  Chumley’s is accessible through an alley, but also has an unused door at 86 Bedford St. The American Communist party gathered there.  On occasion the meeting would be raided by authorities entering through the regular alleyway entrance. The call would go out to “86 it!” meaning that party members were to escape through the 86 Bedford St. door

“Kick the bucket” – The wooden frame from which animals are hung to be slaughtered is known as a “bucket.” The death spasm of the animals causes them to “kick the bucket.”

“Raising Cain” – Cain was the first murderer.  If you make trouble, you are raising the spirit of Cain.

“Neither rhyme nor reason” – From Shakespeare’s As You Like It.

                                    Rosalind: But are you so much in love as your rhymes speak?

                                    Orlando: Neither rhyme nor reason can express how much.

“Honeymoon” – In ancient Babylon, for the month following the wedding the bride’s father would supply his son-in-law with a honey based beer call mead. Because their calendar was lunar based, this period was called the “honey month” or what we know today as the “honeymoon.”  (Why would a father-in-law provide all the beer a son-in-law can drink for the first month of marriage?)

“The whole nine yards” – World War II fighter plans featured .50 caliber machine guns. Their ammo belts measured exactly 27 feet in length. When a pilot fired all of his ammo at a target, he gave it the “whole nine yards.”

That is “the whole nine yards” for today….

Jim Gustafson