What does "on the up and up" mean to you? It means only one thing to me, but as my favorite contemporary linguist pointed out on Wednesday's NPR "Fresh Air" program, it has two distinct meanings, unencumbered by national, georgraphic, or other pattern explanations. He mentions some other words and expressions, too.


http://www-csli.stanford.edu/~nunberg/upandup.html

Also, I wonder which discussion board he's referring to here?

"Out of curiosity, I sent a question about the item to a discussion group that's peopled by dialectologists and other devotees of word-lore."