My old boss used the expression: We have employees up the gump stump -- meaning "we have a lot of employees." Any clues as to the derivation?

I'm a little afraid to know this one.

How come you never asked him where it came from? I would have been too curious, and just halted the conversation to ask. When somebody comes up with an expression like that you just know they love to tell the story behind it, no.

We have employees up the gump stump -- meaning "we have a lot of employees." Any clues as to the derivation?

"Gump stump" is a contraction of "Gump stumped by everything", a reviewer's light-hearted assessment of Forrest Gump, the lead character played by Tom Hanks in the 1994 movie of the same name.

Your boss wasn't exactly saying you had "too many" employees. He was saying too many of your employees were as "Gump stumped" as Forrest Gump.

Well, unlike the previous poster, I wouldn't presume to tell you what your boss meant, bevman. I have a vague recollection of hearing the expression "out the gump stump" meaning the same thing: in excess. And that was in Alabama. Kinda like up or out the yin(g)-yang (now where did that expression come from?).

This doesn't answer your question, but I wanted to let you know I've heard something similar.

This seems to be a slightly different sense:

“Interest rates are so bad,” says Fletcher, whose twinkling eyes and sharp mind defy her years. Sitting next to a portrait of George and Laura Bush she got in the mail, she adds that interest from her CDs has dropped to all-time lows. “It's terrible. … If it wasn't for Social Security, I'd be up a gump stump.”

Kansas City Star Oct 3, 2004



THE MGMT

"Gump stump" is a contraction of "Gump stumped by everything"

The ultimate inspiration for "Gump stump" can be found in this oft-quoted passage in the #1 best-selling book and movie:

"Whenever I really get stumped, I go visit Jenny's grave. She tells me she's always rooting for me."

I have no idea whether this is relevant, but I found this in an "EXCERPT FROM TRANSCRIPT OF MEETING WITH
THE ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF AGRICULTURE FOR CIVIL RIGHTS.
SEPTEMBER 18, 2003":
Now, those employees f or four years have been sitting in limbo with EEO complaints, working in hostile environments in places like Gump Stump, Mississippi Not only are they being hurt economically and socially, I have been in contact with these employees and there is also a physical danger involved. Its not like they are working in Vallejo or Washington D.C., they are in some very remote areas.

And, there's a song called "Opossom Up A Gump Stump" and one called "Rabbit up a gump stump"; hmm--given that plus the ref. to MS, I wonder if the song refers to a gumbo tree.

Here's a quote from a school site that sounds like it has your meaning, bev--welcome aBoard, by the way: We have coordinators, facilitators, special this and special that, up the gump stump.

I also found this quote: If it wasn't for Social Security, I'd be up a gump stump.” And this one:I've been licensed, tenured and degreed up the gump stump.

So, apparently the phrase has at least two meanings: 1.) a whole lot, and 2.) in trouble. Wow--if you find the REAL origin, do post it, please!

sounds like a synonym for wazoo to me...

"Opossom Up A Gump Stump"

I'd always heard it as "Possum up a Gum Stump"; Google agrees with me 539 to 2. I wonder if this is a case of, whaddayacallit*, when you add a sound because it's easier to say, like the b in chimbley (or, if you don't like that one the b in hombre).

Help me out here, nuncle

"Possum up a Gum Stump"; The one I found was by a foreign band--Irish, I think--so perhaps they didn't know the "correct" term! But I too was thinking that perhaps the p might have gotten added to gum, to make it sound better with stump. Oh--I have never heard the word hombre pronounced without the b. You were joking about that, right?

Of course I asked him, my curiousity is not tempered with shyness. Like my mother, who uses all kinds of colloquialisms without knowing the etymology, my boss was unaware of its derivation. He was from Central Pennsylvania, peopled with all kinds of culturally diverse (backward?) sects.

never heard the word hombre pronounced without the b

Depends on how far back you go. It comes from the Latin homin(e).

He was from Central Pennsylvania, peopled with all kinds of culturally diverse (backward?) sects.


But the Chinese food there is good: With sects you get eggroll.

sounds like you've had good sects education, TEd...

eta--c'mere a minute; I have something for you...