#12083
12/06/2000 5:16 AM
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Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 3,065
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Posts: 3,065 |
A very dear friend from the US admitted never having heard the expression "streets ahead" when I used it, the context being "X was streets ahead of the other kids in the class." Is this expression confined to Southern England, or do others recognise it?
Bingley
Bingley
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#12084
12/06/2000 5:47 AM
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Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 11,613
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 11,613 |
It makes me think of a couple of things. First, a race in the city; then, of (for some weird reason) sheets ahead.
As in, three-sheets-to-the-wind ahead, which I feel like just now, but not from imbibing, just the intoxicating effect of being able to be here again at last!
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#12085
12/06/2000 6:27 AM
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Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 3,146
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Posts: 3,146 |
"Streets ahead" is in common usage in Zild ... although I don't know how it got here. Probably from Lunnon, gov!
The idiot also known as Capfka ...
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#12086
12/06/2000 12:18 PM
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Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 1,981
Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 1,981 |
>"X was streets ahead of the other kids in the class."
Sounds fine by me.
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#12087
12/06/2000 1:10 PM
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Joined: Sep 2000
Posts: 4,757
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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and me - but then I wuz raise din Kent, wozni!
Probably descriptive of social subtleties - similar to wrong side of the tracks, do you think?
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#12088
12/06/2000 1:20 PM
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Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 3,439
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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The expression is one I recognize when I hear it and since it's uncommon here in New England it has the effect of being streets ahead of any other kudo. Par example : "She is streets ahead of the other students" seems a higher compliment than "She is 'way ahead of the other students" ..... perhaps because of its very oddity here. It may be familiar to me because I watch a lot of BBC-America stuff on PBS and I've visited GB.  I wonder why it is "streets" and not avenues or lanes or roads ahead? wow
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#12089
12/06/2000 3:49 PM
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Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 10,542
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Posts: 10,542 |
I've never heard this expression in the Midwest; but then we're also known as 'flyover land'.
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#12090
12/06/2000 4:00 PM
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Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 197
member
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member
Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 197 |
I've never heard streets ahead, but strides ahead sounds fine to me. I've also heard of someone being in the lead by "leaps and bounds."
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#12091
12/06/2000 9:13 PM
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Joined: Sep 2000
Posts: 2,891
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Posts: 2,891 |
I have never heard this expression. Like xara, I have heard of strides ahead. However, what is mostly used here is "miles ahead" to mean something/someone who is in advance of everything/everybody else. Odd since we are now using the metric system but I guess this is a leftover from our years using imperial measures. You NEVER hear kilometers ahead (unless you are talking about distance of course ) "Years ahead of its time" is used to describe anything innovative. (usually by marketers/usually really days or weeks ahead of competition  )
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#12092
12/06/2000 10:06 PM
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Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 5,400
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Oct 2000
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similar to wrong side of the tracks, do you think?
this isn't universal--(duh helen!, haven't you caught on yet?) i've always known wrong side of the tracks.
do your bankers have red lining? it the new version of wrong side of the tracks.. they draw a line on the map, and no mortgages or other bank service beyond this line.
When we went to sell our first house, we found none of the potential buyers could get a mortgage. Red lining is illegal, but the bank officer, straight faced, said, oh no, we don't red line, but we don't offer mortgages south of Tremont avenue!
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#12093
12/07/2000 12:04 AM
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Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 866
old hand
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old hand
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 866 |
I'll rsvp for all Australians...... "Streets ahead" is in such common usage throughout Oz that it's taken for granted. I like the 'social connotations' reply, but the phrase is very close to "streaks ahead" - I wonder......
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#12094
12/07/2000 2:14 AM
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Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 3,467
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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I MAY be all wet here, but something tells me I am not. Cribbage is a game played on a board that has (usually) two rows of 30 holes each that you must traverse twice, for a total of 121 points, in order to win the game. Some boards have two sets of 30 holes up and two back to the home peghole.
Each row of thirty holes is called a street, and it is very common when playing cribbage to say of an awesome performance that "I was two streets ahead of him by the last hand." That is RARE!!! When you lose by 31 points to 60 points, that's called a skunk. When you lose by more than 60 points (two streets), it's called a double skunk, and I've only suffered that once in almost half a century of cribbage playing.
My swag is that being streets ahead comes from cribbage.
TEd
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#12095
12/07/2000 3:20 AM
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Joined: Sep 2000
Posts: 347
enthusiast
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enthusiast
Joined: Sep 2000
Posts: 347 |
TEd,
Interesting theory on the origin of "streets ahead". But something else caught my eye...
On Nov 28 you posted:
Most of you are beyond those years, but I, in my mid-fifties...
and today:
..and I've only suffered that once in almost half a century of cribbage playing.
Cribbage since crib age?
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#12096
12/07/2000 4:48 AM
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Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 3,065
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Posts: 3,065 |
I used to play cribbage with my grandfather in my early teens, and I don't remember the rows of holes being called streets, just rows. However, neither of us was very expert so I'm open to correction here.
If I might spring to TEd's defence, if he's in his mid-fifties (say 55) and started playing at eight or nine that would be 46 or 47 years, near enough half a century for me.
Bingley
Bingley
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#12097
12/07/2000 12:06 PM
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Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 3,467
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Marty:
Yup. I was five years old when my daddy taught me how to play. I'll be 55 in March.
I've played a whole bunch of cribbage in my life.
Ted
TEd
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#12098
12/07/2000 1:42 PM
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Joined: Sep 2000
Posts: 4,757
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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streets ahead comes from cribbage
I used to play cribbage with my grandparents, too - I love all the arcanery of terms such as "and one for his hat", but don't specifically remember hearing this one. Sounds plausible, though; on the same lines it could come from Monopoly if it's not much older, which I suspect it is.
PS I still have a couple of the wonderful scoring boards with little turned ivory pegs, including one which is triangular in layout!
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#12099
12/07/2000 6:04 PM
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Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 3,146
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Posts: 3,146 |
Ted said, probably cribbing from notes: I've played a whole bunch of cribbage in my life.
Don't you just love collective nouns? I would never have guessed that the term for more than one cribbage was "a bunch" of cribbage. Thank you, thank you!
The idiot also known as Capfka ...
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#12100
12/07/2000 8:00 PM
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Joined: Aug 2000
Posts: 3,409
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Posts: 3,409 |
PS I still have a couple of the wonderful scoring boards with little turned ivory pegs, including one which is triangular in layout!
I was in my twenties before I learned that cribbage boards could be anything other than triangular, as that was the shape of the boards I grew up with.
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#12101
12/08/2000 5:17 AM
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Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 3,065
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Posts: 3,065 |
In reply to:
I used to play cribbage with my grandparents, too - I love all the arcanery of terms such as "and one for his hat"
As far as I remember, we used to say "and one for his knob" rather than "his hat".
Bingley
Bingley
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#12102
12/08/2000 11:27 AM
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Joined: Sep 2000
Posts: 4,757
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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his knob...Well, I'll be blowed! (  bel) Yes, and there was also "one for his heels", was there not?
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#12103
12/08/2000 1:03 PM
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Joined: Dec 2000
Posts: 13,803
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Dec 2000
Posts: 13,803 |
on for...
We said "one to..." something but I don't remember what.
But then I always used to aggravate my opponents because I played so rarely that I always needed help in remembering how to play and then I almost always won.
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#12104
12/08/2000 2:36 PM
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Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 10,542
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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"one for his knob" aha! a 'cribdegreen'... [but check out the purported inventor's name!] the jack in the suit of the up-card was called Noddy, or His Nobs (fifteen-two, fifteen-four, a pair for six and one for His Nobs) http://members.home.net/willoworks/cribbage.htm[*almost 50 years of cribbage] p.s. - the Mavens have another good entry today (12/08) on mishearing, etc.
http://www.randomhouse.com/wotd/p.p.s. - we used to call His Nobs "nubbins" [this postscript brought to you by the Eternal Golden Braid, or Strange Loops Unlimited]
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#12105
12/08/2000 4:32 PM
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Joined: Aug 2000
Posts: 2,204
Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
Joined: Aug 2000
Posts: 2,204 |
I was taught to play cribbage by my brother, who was in the Royal Navy. Certainly the term "street" was used for one side of the board, and the term "I'm streets ahead of you" was used - with a fair degree of hyperbole, it has to be said.
We also used the terms "One for his Knob" (knob being a term for Head long before it gained common usage for a lower part of the male anatomy!) and "Two for his heels" (when you turn the jack up on the pile after the deal is finished).
I rarely get the cahnce to play, these days, as my wife is not a card player - any chance of a virtual game, TEd?
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#12106
12/08/2000 6:44 PM
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Joined: Dec 2000
Posts: 13,803
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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"They hae slain the Earl o' Murray/And laid him on the green."
Ms Wright heard this as a child as "They hae slain the Earl o' Murray/And Lady Mondegreen,"
There's got to be a special name for a mishearing like this that results in what would be an eponym if it weren't a mishearing. I think mondegreen should be reserved for this meaning and something else be used for ordinary mishearings like "Scuse me while I kiss this guy".
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#12107
12/08/2000 7:41 PM
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Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 3,467
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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> any chance of a virtual game, TEd?
I believe there is, Rhu. Someone, somewhere on the net has a virtual game that two people can meet at. I'll have to get back to you on that. I know for certainty you can do it on AOL, but it's a dollar an hour, and I'm too Scottish to have fun :). And, of course, there's the matter of the stakes :). Say a penny a point, double on skunks???
Just kidding!!!
OH!! Thanks for confirming my swag about streets. I had no idea being streets ahead would be used by anyone other than cribbage players.
TEd
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#12108
12/08/2000 7:54 PM
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Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 10,542
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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you were looking for confirmation, teD? well, I'm pegged out; why didn't you say so! that's a turn-up for the books!! http://www.splange.freeserve.co.uk/cribbage.html
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