Expressions We Have All Heard

Hi all:

How many of us knew these? For sure I didn't.

"Early aircraft throttles had a ball on the end of it, in order to go full throttle the pilot had to push the throttle all the way forward into the wall of the instrument panel. Hence "balls to the wall" for going very fast. And now you know the rest of the story."

And

During WWII, U.S. Airplanes were armed with belts of ammo, which they would shoot during dogfights and on strafing runs. These belts were folded into the wing compartments that fed their machine guns. These belts measure 27 feet and contained hundreds of cartridges. Often times, the pilots would return from their missions having expended all of their bullets on various targets. They would say, "I gave them the whole nine yards," meaning they used up all of their ammunition.

Rick

Well how be dammned. I love trivia so I'll file that away in the subconscious of my mind.

I don't know the whole story but the saying "raining cats and dogs" came about because around the medieval times when people had grass roofs, cats or dogs would be on them trying to hide from the rain and fall off.

The saying "fair to midland" was referring to a town in Midland or "the Midlands", England I guess.

It's been discovered that the old English expressions "blind drunk", "legless" and "paralytic" in reference to drunkenness are due to the effects of lead poisoning, believe it or not.

In days of old, Cider was the most popular drink in England and when it was made using sour apples, a ball of lead would be suspended in the fermenting barrel until the lead was covered in white crystals, known as 'lead sugar'. This would sweeten the sour cider to become a palatable drink - but with a considerable lead content.

The cider was often dispensed in pubs through lead pipes, adding even more lead content.

Heavy drinkers would eventually lose their sight and suffer from paralysis as a result of the lead poisoning.

The cure was to send them to the Spa in English towns such as Bath, Matlock and Harrogate, where the waters were thought to contain healing minerals which the patients would drink and bathe in daily - some were regular visitors, hence the expression "an old soak".

This actually cured them after a week or two, and modern research has found that by drinking the waters and then bathing, the patients would afterwards urinate slightly more than they'd consumed, thereby gradually passing out the lead particles which were poisoning them. Any drinking water and pool would have had the same effect, the cure doesn't require mineral waters, some of which can have higher than recommended levels of natural radioactivity.

It's "fair to middling", from old-fashioned barometer readings. Good weather was labelled as "Fair", bad weather was labelled as "Foul". The word "middling" means between the two.

Looks like you're right. https://grammarist.com/phrase/fair-to-middling-vs-fair-to-midland/

Living in the U.S. that's how I've heard it.

It's been "fair to middlin'" all my life, from Texas to Penna.

It's also been " piss-poor to outstanding" most of my life! ;)

Since we are also talking about personal experieces.. . They said 'Cheer Up-Things Could Be Worse'. So I cheered up and, sure enough, things got worse!

Chuck B

Napamule

Edit: Ok, how about: 'You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink' (....unless you whack him in the mouth!).

My previous post was not an idiom, so I am posting one here: 'Dressed (up) to the Nines'. (A taylor saying...seems like it takes nine yards of material to make a quality suit.) How's that?

Chuck B

Napamule

Edit: A cat does NOT have 9 lives, but the idiom implies they do. Or, when one 'dodges a bullet' (as when, somehow, you escape the consequences expected after an event).

... 'You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink'....

Or, "You can lead a horticulture but you can't make her think".

Eight hours from bottle to throttle ;-)

Kick the tires and light the fires!

It's also been " piss-poor to outstanding" most of my life! ;)

That's pretty good. I'll have to remember that.