Ever since I became a member here, I have been spending too much time on the web !! Since it is such a "fantabulous" discussion group, I was wondering why haven't been there any discussions of phrases, idioms etc ?

A friend of mine who is also fascinated by word origins told me this crazy story about the origin of "saved by the bell" ...

....When our ancestors realized that they were burying a great deal of people before their time had actually come, they came up with a solution. They tied a string onto the "dead" person's hand, buried them, and tied the other end of the string to a bell and then tied it to nearby tree branch. If the person revived enough to ring the bell, their survivors would rush out and dig them up. Hence... "saved by the bell"

Are there any good websites where I could look up these phrases ? Does anyone else have stories about the origins of such commonplace sayings ?

P.S. I finally figured out what the "Title" (Stranger, pooh-bah , carpal tunnel ) meant !! I was completely "discombobulated"! ;)