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Joined: Apr 2000
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Carpal Tunnel
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OP
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 10,542 |
the weekly worthless word is: gardyloo proposed: the word gardyloo, now fallen into desuetude, shall be resurrected and required as a warning cry whenever a congressman is about to put voice to a declamation within the Hallowed Halls of Congress [or substitute 'minister' and 'Parliament'] gardyloo - used in Edinburgh, in the days when chamber pots were in common use, as a warning cry when throwing slops from the windows into the streets; [perhaps from French garde a l'eau - look out for the water; also possibly the source of the word loo] http://members.aol.com/tsuwm
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Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 1,981
Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 1,981 |
Of course we still do that in Edinburgh!
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Posts: 460
addict
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addict
Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 460 |
Brewer has a wonderful citation from Smollett’s ‘Humphry Clinker’:
"At ten o’clock at night the whole cargo of the chamber utensils is flung out of a back window that looks into some street or lane, and the maid calls "Gardy loo" to the passengers."
Smollett doesn’t record any response from the ‘passengers’.
A great way to start the day (see the ‘se’nnight’ post)
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Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 11,613
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 11,613 |
Is it possible? Do I dare? I tremblingly submit to the Supreme one a tentative, uncertain correction: 'garde' is the French word used for the singular You. 'Gardez' goes with the plural You, which is much more likely to have been called down to a street full of people. Gardez probably descended to gardy.
Incidentally--I just saw and tried "that markup thang" (hi, Anna) and couldn't figger it out--will keep tryin'.
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Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 10,542
Carpal Tunnel
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OP
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 10,542 |
Jackie, I actually have to say that I'm sure I really just don't know. http://members.aol.com/tsuwm
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Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 460
addict
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addict
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Jmh:
I came across this passage today in Ford Madox Ford’s Parade’s end, set around the period of World War I:
"There was in Edinburgh a society … where the ladies are all great ladies in tall drawing-rooms; circumspect yet shrewd; still yet with a sense of the comic; frugal yet warmly hospitable. It was perhaps just Edinburgh-ness … "
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Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 1,981
Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 1,981 |
I don't know the quote but Edinburgh (in particular Morningside, where I live) is well known for its ladies. Well dressed, shrewd ladies who know the correct way to pour a cup of tea and know the right way to serve shortbread with precisely the right kind of doily. Cross them if you dare!
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