What Slang Do You Use?

I’m fixing to go to the store. I’m lower than a snakes belly in a wagon wheel rut. She’s madder than a wet hen. Her backside is bigger than a barn. Useless at tits on a boar hog. He’s all hat and no cattle. She could suck the chrome off a trailer hitch. This rain is a frog drownder. If mama ain’t happy, ain’t nobody happy.

That person has the gall of a canal horse!

When asked where someone went, the reply is “he ran around the corner with a rat in his mouth.” My dad picked this one up during WW2 serving at Gander airport in Newfoundland.

Just found this great post again after this week’s Friday email – and wanted to add one of mine. I never realised it was strange until my fiancee and I first met and he laughed his head off. I say “gimme a shufti” which just means “give me a look at that” – no idea where it comes from but my parents have said it my whole life!

There’s so many general Scottish ones too that are still part of my vernacular (I grew up in Aberdeen):
“Oochi beasties” = ouch
“A bit peely wally” = looking a bit ill
“It was hoachin” = it was really busy

Ok I do not see Hawaii represented here so:
Grindz = good eats
Pau = done
She-she = going pee
Da kine = something good
Auntie/Uncle = any elder who is or is not related

Oh my. My mother in law says two shakes of a lambs tail all the time (from a Dutch community in Northern Iowa). Other sayings that I had to adjust to in my married life:
Cute as a bug’s ear
Tables are for glasses not for asses
And maybe the one that made me die, when my silent and gentle father-in-law came in from outside in mid-winter and declared, “It’s colder out there than a witch’s tit in a brass corset.”

I say “two shakes,” too! : ) I’ll be there in two shakes.

These comments are so fun! In southern Colorado, really just the town of Pueblo to be exact, the proper reply to “see you later” is “The good Lord willing and the creek don’t rise.” Which I also understand to be a Johnny Cash song (?) I’ve never heard that phrase be spoken by a non-Johnny Cash human other than in Pueblo, but especially the older folk say it all the time!

My slang is a complete mishmash, given I grew up in South Africa, now live in London, am married to a Frenchman and work in an international organisation.

One of my absolute favourites (particularly in a work context) is a Polish expression – not my monkey, not my circus (which is basically – not my problem). From the french side, we often use “faire des bêtises” if our children are up to no good. I don’t think any English words accurately reflect what it covers, I suppose the closest would be making mischief but it’s still not the same. From Hebrew the word “balagan” which is complete chaos, but also more than that.

I feel like it’s been decades of me calling friends and coworkers Babycakes. I don’t know when it started and it’ll never stop.

We lived in a rural area growing up so my friend’s dad drove us to school every day. After they picked me up he’d proclaim, “And we’re off, like a herd of turtles!”

We have taken it to a whole new level in our house due to my husband’s obsession with Trailer Park Boys. I apologized for something yesterday and he said, “That’s OK. Water under the fridge.” If you know, you know. It’s not rocket appliances.

There are so many good ones here! My grandpa used to describe something nifty as “slicker than snot on a doorknob.” (You could also describe freezing roads/sidewalks that way in its most literal interpretation.) I grew up just using that casually and WOW did I get a reaction the first time it slipped out in college. HA

I notice this a lot when I’m talking to my boys, 3 and 6. First time I said, “hurry up we are running late!” And my son looked at me all confused and said, “Mommy, we are not running.” Similar response when lately I’ve told them “you’re driving me bananas!”
I think I’ve picked up random ones just from reading a lot but I’m also from different regions.
-cat’s out of the bag
-by the skin of our teeth
-blarg (love you, Liz Lemon)
-phooey
-look alive
-once in a blue moon
-does anyone say whack-a-mole for crazy? I don’t know if that’s a thing or something my sister and I say lol
-one my husband and I say that’s just silly is we call all the joints knuckles. Knee knuckle, elbow knuckle. Don’t know when it started but it’s been years.

If I see a lot of traffic on the A9 in Sutherland, (it’s usually pretty sparse) I always say, out loud to myself, “the ferry must be in” because that was the main source of traffic in Stornoway when I lived in the Hebrides.
I like the phrase “they’ve been ruined” for really spoilt children. Also, “where do you stay?” instead of “where do you live?”. Children have a play piece, a snack at playtime and people would go and get the messages, go and get the shopping

When you haven’t seen someone in a long time, you haven’t seen them “in a month of Sundays.”

When a person takes offense and it betrays their own guilt in the situation, it’s “the hit dog hollering.” As in, “if you throw a rock into a pack of dogs, the hit dog will holler every time.”

I’m from Detroit (where clearly many parents and grandparents are from the South.)

I grew up in the Midwest and we used to say in high school “BFE” if something was far away. It stood for Bum F*ck Egypt. As in Amy lives out in BFE. It’s funny hearing or saying that now and discovering who else knows what that means.

Grew up in the South, where we are rich with these.
“If it had been a snake, it would have bit me” in ref to something I’m looking for that is obviously right in front of my face but I don’t see.
“She doesn’t have the sense God gave lettuce” in ref to someone kind of dumb or misguided
“What does that have to do with the price of tea in China?” in ref to something that isn’t helpful to the discussion at hand.
“I don’t want to get into the ‘Who shot John’ about it…” in ref to the minor details of a situation that are being quibbled over. I nannied for a family in NYC for a while after college and the little boy had gotten into a dust-up on the playground. I was describing it to his mom and used this phrase as in “One kid pushed the other, the ball went into the street and they got into an argument about “who shot John” and the next thing I know, little Joe was on the ground crying…” and before I finished the sentence she goes “WHO GOT SHOT??? THERE WAS SOMEONE WITH A GUN AT THE PLAYGROUND?!!?” And I realized quickly that a) she had no idea what this Southern idiom was and b) I should always refrain from using it when discussing children in any context. She did not appreciate my explanation of it either.

From the South–agree on “colder than a witch’s tit”!
We also have a few for being upset: “don’t get riled up” “she has a bee in her bonnet” “madder than a pissed on chicken”
But my favorites I recently learned from Australian co-workers!
“Smaller than a bee’s dick”
“I’m not here to fu*k spiders” : aka I’m not here to mess around

I say to my girls , if they are driving me a bit nutty “you’re giving me the pip!” My mum always said it to us, my girls find it hilarious and sometimes if I’m grumpy they will say “oh be careful! Mums got the pip!”. I’m Australian. Also, if someone ever asked what was for dinner, my dad used to say “bread and goanna (a type of lizard)” so I say that to my girls too. Hilarity ensues.

I am Czech and live in Czechia, so it would be difficult to explain and translate some slang I and my husband use. Each of us comes from different corners of our little country, but it is still far enough that we brought funny and interesting words to the relationship. But as the whole world is full of Anglicisms, we also use lot of English words in our speech. My husband once said “I am on the track” in the meaning “I am coming” (Oh God, he is always late). Now it is our saying and I like it very much :))

What I’ve learned in Minnesota:
“Move your meat, lose your seat” – If you get up, I’m taking your chair
“Madder than a hornet”
“Uff-da!” -Oh!/ wow!/yeesh!
“Crapola” -crap!

Once my grandma stored a large bag of chip in our oven while staying with my family (one of her ovens at home had been broken for decades and she often used it as another cupboard). After a long day my mom started preheating the oven for dinner, only to have all the fire alarms going off and the entire house filled with smoke five minutes later. It was the straw that broke the camel’s back and caused my mom to have a meltdown of epic proportions.

Now, decades later, my family still says “it was chips in the oven” when referring to something that caused someone to loose their temper in a bad way. Or that “(name) has chips in the oven” as a warning when someone is in a bad mood.

My most frequently used idiom is one that I adopted from my grandma.
“Tough titty.”
Or sometimes I’ll use the longer version,
“Tough titty said the kitty.”
And every once in a while I’ll mix it up with the full version,
“Tough titty said the kitty when the milk ran dry.”
It’s my favorite way to say too bad or tough luck.

Another favorite is one that I actually adopted after hearing it on the first season of The Great British Baking Show. Now I saw, “get a wiggle on” to mean hurry up or get going.

Gucci bag – a plastic or paper bag that’s packed with non grocery items
This, that and the other – when you don’t want to go into detail about a certain thing/ transitioning topics and wrapping up the previous story.
Is a frogs ass water tight? – an affirmative
I need that like a hole in my head – a situation or thing you don’t need or want
Getting my ducks in a row – getting organized
Don’t have a cow – stop getting so upset
Whatever floats your dinghy – whatever works

My sweet Southern husband has so many of these that make me laugh, like “colder than a witch’s titty” or “hotter than two rats fucking in a wool sock” – pretty self explanatory but startling the first time you hear them!

Then there’s the ones that just confused me for a while – “toboggan” for beanie (isn’t that a sled?!) and “shorts” for underwear – “I can’t go out with just my shorts on” – him “why not???” – me