So, I asked Matthew if I was a basket case and it got us thinking

I have a great aunt, bless her heart, who is probably the most subtly funny relative I have.  To be honest, I was afraid of her as a child, but as I started growing up I started to see her warped sense of humour.  Perhaps this is where I get my humour from.  It wasn't uncommon to hear her say something like, "heavens to murgatroid child, sit down, you're making me dizzy."  She actually makes me giggle now.  Maybe because I've learned to sit down.

The other night I asked Matthew where the term "basket case" came from.  Now, this is not in reference to my great aunt.  Just bare with me.  We got curious about it and looked it up.  It's not totally known where the term originated from, but a common explanation was from WW1 when a soldier would lose all four limbs and would be carried in a basket.  One would be deemed useless which is a variation of the context we use it in today.

This got me thinking about other things we say and where they came from.  My aunt is known for her weird saying so I just had to look it up.  "Heavens to Murgatroid" comes from a 1944 movie called Meet the People with Bert Lahr and Lucille Ball.  All along I thought it was just something she said ...

There are lots of other sayings that have become second nature to say, but do we really know where the terms come from?  Did you know that "where in the Sam hill"  dates back to  1825 when Samuel was a devil in the opera Der Freishuetz.  When put with "hill" instead of "hell" it became a more approrpiate and mannered way to say "where in the hell" during a time when vulgar words were unproper in public. Excuse my language if it offends anyone.  I'm trying to make a point.

Did you know that "wet your whistle" came from pubs in England that used to bake a whistle into the bottom of their ceramic cups?  When the drink was empty you just had to blow the whistle for the next.  Or that "O.K." first appeared in a Boston newspaper in 1839 as a comedic way and spelling of saying All Correct? They deliberately spelled it Oll Korrect which is where we get O.K. from.  It actually became the slogan for President Martin Van Buren's campaign.

"I'll be a monkey's uncle" was originally a sacrastic remark made against Darwin's theory of evolution and "Son of a gun" was pretty much a slam saying a woman slept with a sailor between cannons on a ship.

Interesting how we just use terms without thinking about where they came from.  

Heavens to Murgatroid!  Where in the sam hill did the time go? I need to go wet my whistle before we're all basket cases! I'll be a monkey's uncle, everything is going to be O.K.  ....  Has a different meaning to me now ... 

The girls and I with my Aunt A. the last time she was in Ontario