December 9, 2025 • 43 mins
Abby and Alan sit down to talk through the dark history of every day expressions and sayings. From mad hatter to taking it with a grain of salt, we get into all of it.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_00 (00:18):
Hello, everybody, and welcome back to another
episode of the Lunatics RadioHour Podcast.
My name is Abby Branker, and Iam sitting here with Alan Kudan.
SPEAKER_01 (00:28):
Hello.
SPEAKER_00 (00:29):
We as humans use a lot of different sayings and
idioms and expressions in oureveryday conversations.
And sometimes the roots of thoseexpressions are quite dark.
SPEAKER_01 (00:42):
Name one.
SPEAKER_00 (00:43):
And the origins have sort of been lost to history.
SPEAKER_01 (00:46):
Like what?
SPEAKER_00 (00:47):
Mad as a hatter, pulling my leg, saved by the
bell.
SPEAKER_01 (00:51):
That was a TV show.
SPEAKER_00 (00:52):
Among other things.
SPEAKER_01 (00:54):
Uh, what was the actor who played Screech who got
arrested?
SPEAKER_00 (00:57):
Justin Diamond?
He passed away.
SPEAKER_01 (01:00):
From what?
SPEAKER_00 (01:00):
From lung cancer.
SPEAKER_01 (01:02):
Oh no.
SPEAKER_00 (01:03):
Yeah.
It's kind of a sad story.
SPEAKER_01 (01:04):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (01:05):
Did I ever tell you that I met Mr.
Belding one time?
SPEAKER_01 (01:08):
Who's that?
SPEAKER_00 (01:08):
Mr.
Belding, the principal fromSaved by the Bell.
SPEAKER_01 (01:12):
Oh, uh no, this has never come up organically in
conversation.
SPEAKER_00 (01:15):
So the actor, obviously, Dennis Haskins,
showed up.
So let me take you through my myorigin story a little bit.
SPEAKER_01 (01:23):
So there you are in Tinder.
unknown (01:25):
No.
SPEAKER_00 (01:25):
Hoffshow where I went to college has these they
don't anymore, but they hadthese crazy bars when I was
there where you had to show IDto be 18 or have a student ID to
enter, and they wouldessentially give you beer for
free.
It was like penny beer nights.
The whole thing was crazy.
But one night, Mr.
Building came to one of thosebars to like meet college girls,
which was gross.
SPEAKER_01 (01:46):
But was he casting for a new season?
unknown (01:49):
None.
SPEAKER_00 (01:50):
As we love to trace back the history of anything and
everything on this podcast,today we are going to talk about
everyday sayings that actuallyhave quite horrifying origins.
Today's sources we have a mentalfloss article, Eight Common
Phrases with Surprisingly DarkOrigins, by Michelle Debzak, an
MPR article by Scott Simon, Whatis the origin of the word
(02:12):
deadline?
An exploration of its etymology,a historyextra.com article, Why
Do We Say Run Amok, the OxfordEnglish Dictionary, and this
very fun website calledPhraseFinder, which was created
by someone named Gary Martin.
It's a super fun website, andI'm going to link it, of course,
in the description of thisepisode, along with our sources.
Starting off with one of myfavorite examples.
(02:34):
People say mad as a hatter, as asynonym for somebody who is
insane or acting insane orcrazy, you know, quote unquote.
But the term refers to actualhatters, people who made hats,
especially people who made felthats.
SPEAKER_01 (02:48):
Why?
SPEAKER_00 (02:48):
Because hatters used to use mercury nitrate in the
felting process, which we nowknow causes serious issues when
humans are exposed to it in aprolonged capacity.
For example, it can cause bothspikes in aggression and mood
swings.
But more seriously, it can causetremors, shakes, issues with
speech, and even confusion andhallucinations.
(03:11):
Sometimes Lewis Carroll's Alicein Wonderland is cited as the
origin for this term.
SPEAKER_01 (03:16):
But that's false.
SPEAKER_00 (03:17):
It is false.
It is not true.
SPEAKER_01 (03:18):
It's because hat makers used to use mercury.
SPEAKER_00 (03:22):
Uh but uh the the this is saying that the term is
was first used as a term.
SPEAKER_01 (03:28):
Wait, why are they using what did the mercury do?
SPEAKER_00 (03:31):
It was used to make fur pelts easier to felt through
this process that was calledcarroting.
SPEAKER_01 (03:36):
Wow.
Yeah.
I've always felt that my peltsare too stiff.
Maybe I'll just bring them withme into my nightly mercury bath.
SPEAKER_00 (03:42):
That's right.
That's a great idea.
Two birds, one stone.
Oh, another saying that I didn'tlook up.
So the term Mad as a Hatter forthe record already existed
before Lewis Carroll wrote Alicein Wonderland.
That was not the first use ofit.
Historian Christopher Hillclaimed that a man from the 17th
century named Roger Crabinspired Carroll's Mad Hatter
character.
It's debated whether or not thisis true, but it's so
(04:04):
interesting.
We're gonna take a little miniside quest anyway.
We do know that Crab was born in1621 and died on September 11th,
1960.
Crabbe was many things,including a soldier, an
herbalist, a writer, and abusinessman.
But one of the more interestingparts about him is that he also
was part of this like very nichereligious lifestyle group.
(04:26):
Essentially, he was somebody whobelieved he was Christian and he
believed that all pleasure wassin.
So he was what was known as aChristian vegetarian, meaning he
was part of a group that citedChristianity as a reason not to
eat animals.
He also became an asceticist,someone who abstained from world
pleasures.
So he was abstinent, he didn't,you know, whatever.
(04:47):
There was a list of things thathe abstained from because he
thought deriving any pleasurefrom life was sinful.
SPEAKER_01 (04:53):
I know all about ascetists.
SPEAKER_00 (04:55):
You do?
SPEAKER_01 (04:55):
Yep.
SPEAKER_00 (04:56):
Tell me more.
SPEAKER_01 (04:56):
I read Siddhartha.
SPEAKER_00 (04:58):
Oh, I haven't read that since like eighth grade.
What?
Why?
It's so good.
You how often do you read it?
It teaches you how to wait andhow to fast.
That's right.
Important lessons for eighthgraders.
So essentially, Crab was veganand abstinent, right?
Just like Siddhartha.
Eventually, he also willinglybecame a hermit because he felt
that any money was sinful.
(05:19):
But before that, before he gaveup his business, he was a
haberdasher and a hatter inChesham.
SPEAKER_01 (05:25):
What's a haberdasher?
SPEAKER_00 (05:27):
A haberdasher is somebody who deals clothing,
essentially.
Like a business owner who sellsclothing and makes clothing and
whatever.
SPEAKER_01 (05:36):
How come that term isn't ubiquitous today?
SPEAKER_00 (05:38):
I think it's a bit of a mouthful.
SPEAKER_01 (05:40):
What do they call them today?
SPEAKER_00 (05:41):
Clothesmakers, shop owners, tailors.
SPEAKER_01 (05:43):
I feel like those are very different things
though.
SPEAKER_00 (05:45):
Yeah, yeah.
Crab gained a reputation for hiseccentric behavior.
Some blamed this on an injurythat he had sustained in battle,
and we do know, right, thatbrain injuries can change your
personality.
But we also now know that if hedid indeed work with Mercury, it
could have had an impact on himas well.
Crab died at the age offifty-nine.
He's buried at StepneyChurchyard.
(06:07):
His gravestone says thefollowing quote Tread gently,
reader, near the dust, committedto this tombstone's rust, for
while 'twas flesh, it held aguest, with universal love
possessed, a soul that stemmedopinions tied, did over sex in
triumphs ride, yet separate fromthe giddy crowd, and paths
(06:29):
tradition had allowed.
Through good and ill reports hepassed, oft censored, yet
approved at last, wouldst thouhis religion know?
In brief 'twas this, to all todo, just as he would be done
unto.
So in kind, nature's law hestood, a temple, undefiled with
blood, a friend to everythingthat's good, the rest angels
(06:50):
alone can fitly tell.
Haste then to them and him, andso farewell.
I'm also not gonna say muchabout this because it is a
spoiler, but one of my favoritepodcasts of all time, S Town, is
worth a listen if you'reinterested in this topic at all.
S Town?
S Town.
SPEAKER_01 (07:09):
Is that Seattle?
SPEAKER_00 (07:10):
No, it takes place in the South, but it's it's
incredibly Sarasota.
No, in the middle south.
SPEAKER_01 (07:17):
Seattle?
SPEAKER_00 (07:19):
Alright.
Let's talk about riding shotgun.
SPEAKER_01 (07:22):
I know all about riding shotgun.
SPEAKER_00 (07:25):
Tell us.
SPEAKER_01 (07:26):
So it comes from the days of transporting things by
wagon.
SPEAKER_00 (07:30):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (07:30):
Because someone had to sit next to the driver with a
shotgun to stop like bandits andwolves and stuff.
SPEAKER_00 (07:35):
That's exactly correct.
SPEAKER_01 (07:36):
Yeah, okay.
Next one, please.
SPEAKER_00 (07:38):
Well, and also someone would sit there just as
a show of force.
Like they would hold theshotgun.
So literally the person in thepassenger seat would be holding
the gun like a security guard.
And sometimes they were, youknow, actually, of course, ready
to fire, but sometimes it waskind of like you'd be a a a
moving target if you didn't havea body in that seat.
SPEAKER_01 (07:56):
Well, yeah, because you you're just walking around
with the big Scrooge McDuckmoney signs all over your wagon.
SPEAKER_00 (08:02):
Exactly.
The saying all but disappeareduntil the 1920s and 30s when
Hollywood revived it with therise of the Western.
SPEAKER_01 (08:09):
That makes sense.
SPEAKER_00 (08:10):
Yeah.
I think that's an interestingone.
The term actually really becamepopular when newspapers started
using it.
And then another version wasshotgun messenger, but obviously
riding shotgun became the thingthat we say today when we want
to sit in the front seat of acar, but we don't want to drive.
SPEAKER_01 (08:25):
And how did that evolve from providing security
roadside to shotgunning a beer?
SPEAKER_00 (08:32):
It's actually not super clear where that has come
from.
The the articles online are sortof like, yeah, it's from the
mid-20th century when it waslikely popularized by college
students.
SPEAKER_01 (08:46):
So it is popularized by college students.
So we need to contact a college,like Oxford because they're
smart.
SPEAKER_00 (08:54):
Yeah.
Yeah.
It's a good research project.
Yeah.
We need to know.
If you're listening and you arean Oxford uh research fellow,
give us a ring.
The term pulling my leg comesfrom criminal slang.
SPEAKER_01 (09:07):
Speaking of slang, do you know what it stands for?
SPEAKER_00 (09:09):
No.
Do you?
SPEAKER_01 (09:11):
You c you can guess.
SPEAKER_00 (09:12):
It's something language.
SPEAKER_01 (09:14):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (09:15):
Silly language.
SPEAKER_01 (09:16):
Silly language, that's it.
Yeah.
It's street language.
SPEAKER_00 (09:19):
Oh, well, that makes sense.
So pulling my leg dates back tocriminal slang in the 18th and
19th century in England.
Something that it originally wasrelated to this act of like
tripping somebody as a way torob them.
Like literally, you know, likeyou would tug their leg to make
them stumble, and then you wouldtake their wallet or whatever.
Over time, though, as typicalwith these things, the violent
(09:41):
meeting evolved, and now it's,you know, as we know, it's kind
of like you're pulling my leg,you're tricking me, you're lying
to me, you're pulling one overon me.
There's another sort ofalternate origin which dates
back to the theater and thecircus.
SPEAKER_01 (09:55):
Uh no, that makes sense.
It originated in the Cirque dePaleg.
SPEAKER_00 (10:00):
That's good, Alan.
Uh again, very similarly in thisone, it it came from the act of
one performer literally pullingon someone's leg to trip them or
distract another performer,which seems pretty
mean-spirited.
SPEAKER_01 (10:14):
Why would they do that?
SPEAKER_00 (10:16):
And it kind of evolved into like a playful
teasing.
I don't know, maybe if you weretrying to look better than them
in the circus.
There's also an old Englishexpression that sort of means to
entangle somebody or hinder themin some way, metaphorically
extending to tricking or foolingsomebody.
So it's all, you know, thatone's pretty close.
That one you can kind of see thethrough lines to where we are
(10:36):
today.
SPEAKER_01 (10:37):
Thy grasp mine pantaloons.
SPEAKER_00 (10:40):
Okay, Alan, if you had to guess where kicking the
bucket came from, this one's alittle bit dark.
SPEAKER_01 (10:46):
Uh it's from hanging a pig in a barn.
SPEAKER_00 (10:48):
How do you know everything?
That's so crazy.
SPEAKER_01 (10:51):
How do you not know it?
SPEAKER_00 (10:52):
I spent so many hours researching this, and you
I could just sit down and servethese to you and you would know
them.
What a waste of my time.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (11:00):
100%.
SPEAKER_00 (11:01):
So the idiom to kick the bucket, which now of course
we use it to mean to die in kindof a callous way, like, oh,
Oscar kicked the bucket.
There's there's a few differenttheories behind it, but Alan is
right.
One of those, and the strongesttheory, involves animal
slaughter.
SPEAKER_01 (11:17):
I can't believe you've never strung up a pig.
SPEAKER_00 (11:20):
You've certainly never strung up a pig.
SPEAKER_01 (11:22):
You would know all these things if you just, you
know, grew up on like a dairyfarm or something.
SPEAKER_00 (11:27):
Don't even start with me.
One of our biggest fights as acouple is that Alan doesn't
believe that I grew up on thecountry's oldest dairy farm,
which I did.
It doesn't exist.
It does exist.
It still exists now.
SPEAKER_01 (11:40):
Cows aren't real.
SPEAKER_00 (11:41):
Okay.
So typically when you would killa pig, the animal would be hung
from a wooden beam, which wasalso known as a yoke or a
bucket.
So the bucket was not a bucketas we know it today.
Technically, it's a rafter.
Yeah, but okay.
And then as the poor creaturedied, as it I guess it was not
totally strung up before.
SPEAKER_01 (12:02):
Poor creature.
You don't know this, maybe it'sa criminal.
SPEAKER_00 (12:05):
It w the pig?
SPEAKER_01 (12:06):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (12:06):
It would often, you know, struggle and kick, of
course, against um the bucketbeneath it.
Okay, so we just looked this up.
So a beam bucket or a bucketbeam is this sort of custom-made
steel connection in woodconstruction, so in wooden
barns, which is when peoplewould be, you know, talking of
using this phrase.
There would have been woodenbarns.
As opposed to what?
(12:28):
And it transfers vertical loadfrom one wooden beam to another.
SPEAKER_01 (12:32):
What have you seen?
A not wooden barn.
SPEAKER_00 (12:33):
I've seen aluminum metal barns, certainly.
SPEAKER_01 (12:36):
I feel like that their boy, they're like hangers.
SPEAKER_00 (12:38):
Alright, well, we're splitting hairs.
So another theory points to aCatholic practice.
So this would involve a bucketof holy water, and it would be
placed at the feet of adeceased, and so visitors would
sort of sprinkle the water alongthe deceased for as part of like
a last last rites ritual.
(12:59):
But sometimes if the bucket wasaccidentally kicked, it was, you
know, bad omen, bad vibes.
SPEAKER_01 (13:05):
Was it on the bed or on the floor?
SPEAKER_00 (13:07):
It would be on the floor, but like if one of the
passerby, not the corpse kickedit, but if like uh someone came
in and got a little tooenthusiastic and kicked it as
they were walking around.
SPEAKER_01 (13:17):
Sorry, just this is like olden times.
And if the bucket is on the bedand you know, the quote unquote
corpse gets sprinkled and startstwitching a little bit, you're
like, oh no, it's haunted.
Quick, drive a spike throughtheir forehead.
SPEAKER_00 (13:30):
Quick, we have a horror movie.
SPEAKER_01 (13:31):
And definitely not someone who's just really
injured.
Quick, bury them alive.
SPEAKER_00 (13:36):
But despite all of that, it seems the much more
accepted version of the historyis the animal.
SPEAKER_01 (13:43):
Yeah, the bucket beam.
SPEAKER_00 (13:44):
All right, Alan, you know everything.
So tell us, do you know theorigin of taking it with a grain
of salt?
SPEAKER_01 (13:50):
No.
SPEAKER_00 (13:50):
Oh, I've stumped him.
This is one of the oldestphrases that we're going to talk
about today.
Taking it with a grain of saltdates back to ancient Rome.
The phrase's first known usedates back to Pliny the Elder's
Naturalis Historia from thefirst century AD.
Shout out to Pliny the Elder.
We have talked about Pliny fromtime to time on this podcast.
(14:13):
Most recently, and probably theat the most at length, was
during our dancing plague uhseries, The Dancing Plague from
1518, which still remains one ofmy favorite series.
SPEAKER_01 (14:24):
Pliny the Elder dropped some fat beats and
caused so many people to dance.
SPEAKER_00 (14:51):
Well, he really wasn't there.
He was he acted as a secondhandsource.
SPEAKER_01 (14:55):
No, he's like Banksy.
You never know where he'soperating.
SPEAKER_00 (14:57):
That's right.
He's still here today.
So back to taking it with agrain of salt, Pliny's use of
the term comes in the form of arecipe.
More specifically, an antidote,an anecdote to a poison.
Pliny wrote that the anecdoteshould be taken with a grain of
salt, which he claims will makethe poison less potent and make
the concoction easier toswallow.
(15:19):
So here's the a quote of thetranslated passage.
Quote, take two dried walnuts,two figs, and twenty leaves of
roux, pound them all togetherwith the addition of a grain of
salt.
If a person takes this mixturefasting, he will be proof
against all poisons for thatday.
End quote.
SPEAKER_01 (15:39):
That's false.
That is pure anaphylaxis.
SPEAKER_00 (15:42):
Well, you are indeed allergic to some of those
ingredients.
The saying became a metaphorover time.
Instead of using salt to lessenthe intensity of a poison, the
saying, as we know, now impliesthat we should reduce the
meaning or validity of what weare about to hear, which I don't
know.
I feel like that's a prettysimilar evolution.
Of all the kind of sayings andhow they've evolved that we're
(16:05):
going to talk about today, thatone's pretty clear.
SPEAKER_01 (16:07):
Sure.
SPEAKER_00 (16:07):
It went from literal to metaphorical.
SPEAKER_01 (16:10):
Okay.
SPEAKER_00 (16:11):
Saved by the bell.
So the phrase saved by the bell,Alan, do you know what it's
from?
SPEAKER_01 (16:16):
Yeah, it's from the TV show.
SPEAKER_00 (16:18):
So there's two different paths.
One is that it's often kind ofthought of and associated with
boxing, right?
Where there was there's onefighter who's really down for
the count, he's not doing agreat job, and when the bell
rings and the round ends, it'skind of a break for him, right?
So that's obviously like savedby the bell.
But there's folklore that datesback even further, connected to
(16:39):
a phrase that's a little bitmore spooky in origin.
There was, which we've talkedabout many times on this show,
but there was this fear from theVictorian era of being buried
alive, so much so that theywould put bells above coffins
with strings, and the stringwould be around somebody's
finger.
So the idea was if somebody wokeup and they were buried
(17:01):
accidentally and they were stillalive, they could move their
hand and you would hear theringing of the bell and you
could save them before they gotbefore they died from being
buried alive.
SPEAKER_01 (17:11):
Well, that's pretty fun.
I thought you were gonna sayit's from executions where
somebody would be like, youknow, waiting in their cell and
they hear the bell tower in thedistance, and they're like, oh
whew, saved by the bell.
And then, you know, someonewould have to be like, I got
some bad news for you.
SPEAKER_00 (17:25):
I don't get why they would think that they were
saved.
SPEAKER_01 (17:27):
That that's a for whom the bell tolls reference.
SPEAKER_00 (17:30):
Oh, I've never read that.
SPEAKER_01 (17:32):
I I thought you were a literary major.
Ask not for whom the bell tolls.
It tolls for thee.
Did you even go to college?
SPEAKER_00 (17:40):
That's where I met Mr.
Belding.
This whole idea of like thebells outside of coffins and all
of the Victorian era paranoiaaround being buried alive is
loosely connected, right, tovampires.
To vampires.
Like literally to the origins ofwhere we get that mythology,
(18:03):
because people didn't quiteunderstand what happened in the
human body after it was buried.
And so if they would reopen agrave and see that somebody's
fingernails had grown or, youknow, bodily fluids had moved,
they would freak out and thinkthat that person was undead or
alive or whatever.
They had come alive after, youknow, or they weren't really
dead when they were buried.
(18:24):
So it's so fascinating, and weend up talking about this stuff
all the time.
All right, Alan, tell us theroot of the phrase caught
red-handed.
SPEAKER_01 (18:31):
I'm half remembering this.
It has something to do withbeing a pickpocket and when they
stole something, it was like ait was like a uh they would
leave a mark on their hands.
Like it would be like anentrapment type thing.
SPEAKER_00 (18:43):
Well, let's fact-check you.
The funny thing is, being caughtred-handed is actually quite
similar to what it means now.
Like it it originally also meantto be discovered in the act of
doing something wrong orillegal, especially in
connection to like being caughtwith like undeniable proof,
right?
That's kind of the whole pointof the saying.
So this phrase actually comesfrom medieval Scottish law.
(19:07):
So now we're talking about myancestors.
In medieval Scottish law, amurderer uh or a thief or any
kind of criminal would beconvicted only if they were
caught with the victim's bloodstill on their hands.
And we know that's from earlylegal texts from the 15th
century, which use the termred-handed to describe criminals
(19:27):
that were apprehended again withliteral visible blood marking
their guilt.
Of course, over time, thisphrase has evolved and it
doesn't just refer to like superviolent crimes anymore.
So there's a bit of a myth thatwe're gonna try to debunk around
the phrase rule of thumb, whichis often misidentified in its
origin.
So some people incorrectly saythat it comes from this old
(19:50):
British law that would allow aman to beat his wife with a
stick no thicker than his thumb.
SPEAKER_01 (19:56):
Yes.
SPEAKER_00 (19:57):
That's that's not true.
SPEAKER_01 (19:58):
100% true.
I learned that from BoondockSaints.
SPEAKER_00 (20:00):
That law never actually existed.
Sure it did.
I haven't seen Boondock Saintsin so long.
That was a firefight.
Wow, you're in rare form today.
So the real origin of rule ofthumb is far more boring, but we
love that it's not connected todomestic violence.
So different types ofcraftspeople or tradespeople
(20:23):
dating back to the 17th centuryoften sort of had to rely on
because there wasn't maybe theinvention of or widespread use
of rulers and things like that.
So they would kind of useapproximate measurements when
they were looking at the body,and the thumb was a convenient
and common reference point forlike a measurement.
SPEAKER_01 (20:44):
So the the whole beat your wife with a stick was
never a law.
It's more of just a guideline.
Because if it's small enough, itwould leave it wouldn't like
leave permanent damage.
SPEAKER_00 (20:57):
Yeah, but this this isn't where the the phrase is
from.
SPEAKER_01 (21:00):
It is because I learned all about it in Boondock
Saints.
SPEAKER_00 (21:03):
That's right.
And I forgot that that is ahistoric film.
This was also used by brewers.
So brewers would sometimes checkthe temperature of beer or ale
with the thumb rather than athermometer.
They kind of, you know, theycould feel it out.
SPEAKER_01 (21:18):
It reminds me of our famous story when uh my
grandfather was out to dinnerwith uh the rest of my family,
and he always loved getting hissoup.
He always ordered his soup ashot as the kitchen could
possibly make it.
Yeah.
Like scaldingly, scaldingly hot.
SPEAKER_00 (21:35):
A l lawsuit waiting to happen.
SPEAKER_01 (21:37):
It was a very common occurrence for him to send soup
back to be heated up.
And so one time a waitress hadbrought the soup back after
reheating it, and before sheeven put it down, my grandfather
said, That's not hot enough, youneed to send it back.
SPEAKER_00 (21:54):
Oh my god.
SPEAKER_01 (21:55):
And she's like, Sir, I don't mean to be rude, but you
haven't even tried it.
SPEAKER_00 (21:59):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (21:59):
And he says, Yeah, but your thumb's in it, so if it
was hot enough, you'd bescreaming.
SPEAKER_00 (22:05):
Oh.
What kind of soup would he eat?
SPEAKER_01 (22:08):
It doesn't matter.
He just loved soup.
SPEAKER_00 (22:10):
He loved soup.
You love soup too.
So, Alan, I just looked this up,and actually, that incorrect
domestic violence origin storydidn't appear until the 20th
century and has been repeatedlyproven wrong by historians.
SPEAKER_01 (22:24):
Technically the 21st century, because that's when
Boondock Sades came out.
SPEAKER_00 (22:27):
That's when it first appeared, I'm saying.
Alright, Alan, tell us aboutBreak a Leg.
SPEAKER_01 (22:31):
Break a leg comes from theater.
Uh the I mean sorry.
Break a leg has a few differentorigins.
It's one of those things thatcannot actually be confirmed.
But one of the most acceptedorigins is having to do with
theater where you come throughthe curtain, the bits of the
curtain are called legs.
(22:52):
So you are breaking a leg of acurtain by parting it to come
out.
SPEAKER_00 (22:56):
So as we all know, saying good luck to somebody
who's about to dance in front ofan audience or go on stage is
considered bad luck.
And instead, actors tend to saybreak a leg to each other.
The exact origin of this one isa little bit unclear.
There's two different theories.
So the first comes from thisidea of breaking the leg line,
which meant if someone broke theline of the curtain or the stage
(23:19):
border by stepping onto thestage, then they earned sort of
the role or they earned a bow.
That's what I said.
Yeah.
Others trace it to vaudevillewhen performers had hoped to do
so well that they wouldenergetically bend or break a
leg in repeated bows, right?
That they would sort of havebeen bowed, bowed to the point
(23:41):
of exhaustion because theyperformed so incredibly.
I'm just going to content warn.
This one is certainly dark andalso true crime-based.
So s feel free to skip ahead aminute or two if you'd like.
Alan, do you know where drinkingthe Kool-Aid comes from?
SPEAKER_01 (23:54):
I do.
SPEAKER_00 (23:55):
Tell us.
SPEAKER_01 (23:56):
From from Jim Jones and his great party hosting
abilities.
SPEAKER_00 (24:00):
Oh boy.
Drinking the Kool-Aid comes fromthe Jonestown cult murders from
November 18th, 1978, when JimJones led over 900 members of
the People's Temple to commitmass suicide by drinking a
flavored drink that was spikedwith cyanide, tranquilizers, and
other sedatives.
SPEAKER_01 (24:18):
It was actually not Kool-Aid.
SPEAKER_00 (24:20):
Correct.
Do you know what it was?
SPEAKER_01 (24:21):
Flavorade?
SPEAKER_00 (24:23):
That's right.
It's generally believed that itwas flavor aid and not Kool-Aid.
SPEAKER_01 (24:26):
Can you just be can you just imagine being on the
way out and then still beinglike, you know what?
We should get the discountversion of this.
SPEAKER_00 (24:35):
We're not even gonna splurge for so Kool-Aid is like
the the better version.
I didn't grow up on either, so Idon't know.
SPEAKER_01 (24:44):
That's right, because you grew up on the
world's oldest dairy farm.
SPEAKER_00 (24:47):
That's right.
That's a right.
I grew up on milk, on calcium.
The Jonestown settlement wasbased in Guyana.
So how did this horrifying eventinspire a commonplace saying?
This saying distills the essenceof the thing, really, meaning to
blindly follow a leader oranybody, going along with
something problematic withoutquestioning it enough.
(25:07):
It also has some similarities tothe old question, would you jump
off a bridge just becausewhoever told you to?
But drinking the Kool-Aid is notan amazing term to use, and I'm
certainly someone who's guiltyof it.
But in reality, Jones forced 900people, including kids, to take
their own lives.
It was a horrible tragedy.
Talking about horribletragedies, there is a phrase
(25:29):
that comes from the Civil War.
Do you know what phrase it is,Alan?
Okay.
Everything else is so easy foryou, so let's level it up.
SPEAKER_01 (25:37):
A phrase from the Civil War.
Is there any more context?
SPEAKER_00 (25:41):
The American Civil War.
Right.
You said this word, you said Iwas very good at this in our
vows, in your vows to me at ourwedding.
You said, And by God, you alwayshit your partner deadlines.
Meeting a deadline dates back tothe American Civil War in the
1860s, when a deadline markedthe territory or border of a
(26:03):
prison.
So kind of like this idea of anopen air prison where there was
a ditch or some sort of line inthe ground that marked the
boundary.
And if a soldier that wasimprisoned by the other side
crossed this line, they may beshot.
Hence the deadline.
SPEAKER_01 (26:17):
Do they yell?
You crossed a line, buddy.
SPEAKER_00 (26:20):
Or you missed the deadline, pal.
That's what they yell at you atwork nowadays.
Now it means, as we all know,the due date for something.
I think the evolution there isright.
It was like something that couldnot be missed, something that
was pivotal.
It was a deadline.
Alan, tell us do you know aboutbiting the bullet?
SPEAKER_01 (26:37):
I thought it was a suicide reference.
SPEAKER_00 (26:38):
Yeah, I think I thought that too, but it's not.
In today, in society today,people are often urged to bite
the bullet when they must dosomething that they really don't
want to do, right?
Just bite the bullet and go tothe grocery store.
I hate the grocery store.
SPEAKER_01 (26:55):
The ultimate human trial.
SPEAKER_00 (26:59):
So, right, today it's like, okay, you have to do
something annoying, you have to,you know, go through something
awkward, something you reallydon't want to do.
But hundreds of years ago, thiswas much more than something of
annoyance.
This was far more literal andfar more harrowing.
The expression is often trackedback to battlefield medicine
(27:21):
when hurt or wounded soldierswere subjected to surgery, and
of course they didn't have, youknow, painkillers or anesthesia
and things like that back then.
SPEAKER_01 (27:29):
They certainly did.
SPEAKER_00 (27:30):
Well, they weren't they didn't always have them on
the battlefield.
SPEAKER_01 (27:33):
In appropriate supply, but they certainly had
lots and lots of booze and tonsof opium.
SPEAKER_00 (27:40):
Sure.
But but but again, I'm sayingthat stuff existed, but maybe
not on every battlefield medicaltent.
SPEAKER_01 (27:46):
Right, yeah.
Not every operation had theappropriate tools.
Right.
So a lot of people had to gettheir like BBLs done without
proper anesthetic.
SPEAKER_00 (27:54):
A more popular depiction in film, good I'm
yeah, you know what BBL means.
A more popular depiction of thisin film is usually biting down
on a leather strap whensomething painful was about to
happen medically.
But a bullet was also an option.
SPEAKER_01 (28:09):
Why use a bullet?
It's gonna crack your tooth.
SPEAKER_00 (28:12):
Maybe that's what they had.
SPEAKER_01 (28:13):
They don't have a stick?
SPEAKER_00 (28:15):
So this improvised state.
SPEAKER_01 (28:16):
It literally grows on trees.
SPEAKER_00 (28:18):
Maybe if they're in a desert, they don't.
Or the tundra.
All right?
War is everywhere.
SPEAKER_01 (28:24):
But you're gonna bite a bullet, which is gonna
cover one side of your mouth andit's metal, so you can crack
your tooth.
SPEAKER_00 (28:30):
This improvised safeguard had two pros.
One to keep people fromscreaming and also from damaging
their tongues.
But historians have questionedthis origin story as much as you
are right now.
Because it's dumb.
Noting the absence of any sortof meaningful evidence and the
fact that military surgeonsusually carried leather straps
(28:51):
for this.
And again, as we've seen on TV.
SPEAKER_01 (28:53):
Get a wooden spoon.
SPEAKER_00 (28:54):
Oof.
What?
I don't like the taste of wood.
SPEAKER_01 (28:57):
You like the taste of metal more?
SPEAKER_00 (28:59):
No, leather strap is the best.
It's like jerky.
Another theory, and this is fromthis is actually a book that we
have in our bathroom, Allen.
SPEAKER_01 (29:09):
Oh, um, how to relax?
SPEAKER_00 (29:11):
In this 1976 volume, a classical dictionary of the
vulgar tongue, English writerFrancis Gross describes the
slang term nightingale, used forsoldiers who cried out while
while being publicly flogged orbeaten.
He noted that soldiers ofcertain regiments prided
themselves on stoically enduringpunishment and would quote, chew
(29:34):
a bullet, quote, to keep themfrom screaming out or yelling
out as they were getting beaten.
SPEAKER_01 (29:39):
I guess I guess it's kind of smart because if you
have a bullet between your teethand you get hit so hard that you
really chomp down on it and itmakes the bullet fire.
Maybe you can kill your yourattacker.
Oh, but no, because this is withlike ball and powder for like
muskets and shit, right?
Or do they use cartridges?
SPEAKER_00 (29:59):
In the 1700s, you tell me.
SPEAKER_01 (30:01):
1700s was absolutely like muskets and yeah.
So you'd have to also fill yourmouth with gunpowder.
SPEAKER_00 (30:08):
Hey, I'm sure it's been done.
SPEAKER_01 (30:10):
Rock and roll.
SPEAKER_00 (30:11):
Quoting from the Vulgar Tongue quote a soldier
who, as the term is, sings outat the Halberts.
It is a point of honor in someregiments.
the grenadiers never to cry outor become nightingales, whilst
under the discipline of the catof ninetales, to avoid which
they chew a bullet.
End quote.
Now, thankfully, both this very,very upsetting punishment and
(30:36):
uh, you know, the use of bitingdown on a thing during surgery
have been solved.
Those are not things that weoften run into, at least for
now.
So that's the good news.
Alan, what's the origin of thephrase hot shot?
SPEAKER_01 (31:15):
Hotshot?
Every reference to the termhotshot that I can think of is
modern.
SPEAKER_00 (31:21):
All right.
So a hotshot as we know ittoday, right?
How would you describe a hotshotas we would use that term right
now?
SPEAKER_01 (31:28):
A hot shot is when you add fire damage to your
attack because then you can poplead balloons.
SPEAKER_00 (31:33):
I would say that a hotshot is a phrase or a way to
describe somebody usually like ayounger kind of like overly
confident show off type of apeacock person.
They might rub people the wrongway around them because they are
kind of a successful show off.
SPEAKER_01 (31:49):
It's someone who's talented and not afraid to show
it.
SPEAKER_00 (31:51):
They're not humble.
But so this phrase started witha much more literal meaning as
they often do.
Hundreds of years ago a hot shotreferred to a cannonball that
was heated so much that itstarted to glow.
It was then fired into an enemyvessel and it would set it on
fire.
SPEAKER_01 (32:09):
What I tell you, you add fire damage to your attack.
SPEAKER_00 (32:11):
You were saying it from like a gameplay perspective
though and this is about thesame thing.
SPEAKER_01 (32:15):
Well it's not well it's not really it's at you
added to the pirate ship monkey.
SPEAKER_00 (32:19):
Who out there plays balloons?
Just us?
So these cannonballs were kindof kept warm on grates or like
in special furnaces over firesbecause they could very easily
turn gunpowder into flame.
So they were kind of verycarefully guarded and kept warm.
They also had to be like whenthey were actually shot into the
the thing the ship or thewhatever they were trying to set
(32:41):
on fire they had to be done ithad to be done with extreme
precision and very like precisemeasurements because it was so
flammable.
SPEAKER_01 (32:48):
So a lot of these ships had cats because they take
care of the mice?
Yeah.
They would have to like fight sohard to keep the cat away from
the warm cannonballs.
SPEAKER_00 (32:57):
Oh that's so cute.
Alan speaking of pirates andships do you know the origin of
the phrase show your truecolors?
SPEAKER_01 (33:07):
Uh yeah that's has to do with flying your flags.
So very oftentimes people woulddo false flag operations where
you put up the wrong flagbecause that was really the only
way to identify what a ship isis based off what flag they're
flying.
SPEAKER_00 (33:21):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (33:22):
So to show your true colors would be to show your
true flag.
SPEAKER_00 (33:25):
How would that work?
SPEAKER_01 (33:26):
What do you mean?
SPEAKER_00 (33:27):
They would have to take down the enemy flag the
fake flag and put up anotherflag.
SPEAKER_01 (33:31):
So say you're a smuggler, right?
Okay.
And you're trying to get stufffrom the Caribbean to Europe.
Uh you are going to have to gothrough so many different like
checkpoints?
Uh just different areas of waterthat are controlled by different
nations.
SPEAKER_00 (33:50):
Port of call.
SPEAKER_01 (33:51):
And so like one part is going to be friendly to
Spain.
One part is going to be friendlyto England one part is friendly
to France.
And it's part of your smugglerknowledge to know where you are
and what flag needs to be shownat what time and what flag would
get you shot immediately.
SPEAKER_00 (34:09):
Whoa, that's interesting.
But yeah you're totally right nonotes.
So let's talk about the phraseto turn a blind eye.
Of course today this means towillfully or knowingly ignore
something.
We know from the Oxford EnglishDictionary that this one dates
back to at least 1698, which isa bit contradictory because
(34:30):
generally the idiom is seen theidiom is thought to be inspired
by an event from 1801, theBattle of Copenhagen but we see
that it's been used you know inwritings from 1698.
Vice Admiral Horatio Nelson hadone blind eye.
When the signal came that sortof on the battlefield right that
alerted him to stop his attackhe claimed I really didn't see
(34:52):
the signal and he was kind oflooking through his one spy
glass and it became like okay hehas one eye but also he fucking
saw the signal.
He just didn't want to see thesignal.
SPEAKER_01 (35:02):
It's the uh the old timey equivalent of oh no you're
we're you're breaking up yeahthat's not even a thing anymore.
SPEAKER_00 (35:12):
Right.
The signals are too good now.
Well it's not true at all itjust doesn't make it it doesn't
make the noises anymore.
Yeah.
All right Alan since you're sosmart tell us about the phrase
to run amok.
SPEAKER_01 (35:23):
Uh to run amok is actually a more modern version
of another famous quotation fromPliny the Elder who was famous
for coining the phrase beware ofthoughts.
SPEAKER_00 (35:36):
Beware of thoughts?
Who taught you that?
Pliny the Elder You shouldn'twhatever websites you're on make
me nervous.
Today running amok perhapsrepopulated by the 1993 hit
Hocus Pocus is used to describesomeone who is out of control.
But the origins of this sayingare you just softballing the the
(35:56):
hit hocus pocus.
Yeah because that's like such afun little moment in that movie.
But the origins uh of course arequite different.
According to theHistoryExtra.com article Captain
Cook defined a muck in the 1770sas quote to get drunk with
opium, to sally forth from thehouse indiscriminately killing
and maiming villagers andanimals in a frenzied attack end
(36:19):
quote.
This is from his travels toMalaysia where this sort of fit
was often thought to be causedby this evil tiger spirit called
Hantu Belin which was believedto possess a person and sort of
drive them into this mad,murderous rampage.
Sadly this usually ended withthe possessed quote unquote
possessed person eithercommitting suicide or being
(36:41):
killed by others to stop themadness.
SPEAKER_01 (36:43):
So like I said it's just another way of saying you
gotta stay in control.
SPEAKER_00 (36:49):
That's right.
So this next one is darkcertainly because that's what
we're doing here but it alsokind of has a beautiful element
to it at the beginning.
SPEAKER_01 (36:57):
What is it?
SPEAKER_00 (36:58):
Do you know the origins of the phrase white
elephant?
SPEAKER_01 (37:01):
White elephant?
SPEAKER_00 (37:02):
Yeah.
Like you know as the holidaysapproach some of us may find
ourselves playing some versionof white elephant or Yankee
swap, but the phrase whiteelephant wasn't always in
reference to this game.
There's kind of a deeper origin.
SPEAKER_01 (37:16):
I do not know.
SPEAKER_00 (37:17):
According to the Oxford English Dictionary a
white elephant is quote apossession that is useless or
troublesome, especially one thatis expensive to maintain or
difficult to dispose of endquote.
SPEAKER_01 (37:30):
Unlike those gray elephants which are so much more
easy.
SPEAKER_00 (37:34):
Let me tell you why the white elephant came to be
thought of this way.
So the saying actually comesfrom Southeast Asia particularly
in modern day Thailand whiteelephants were considered sacred
and incredibly rare.
So giving one as a gift was agreat honor but it was way more
complicated than that.
Essentially because they were sosacred and rare white elephants
(37:58):
would not be used for labor.
SPEAKER_01 (38:08):
Sorry I just pictured an elephant in a little
nurse's outfit helping someonein labor.
SPEAKER_00 (38:13):
But refusing this gift or mistreating an elephant
was like unthinkable, right?
Because they were so sacred.
So if someone in power or wealthwanted to financially ruin
somebody else in a very passiveaggressive way, they would give
them this horrible burden ofthis very sacred white elephant.
SPEAKER_01 (38:30):
So gifts should be burdens no I that's your
takeaway?
I've been doing it right allalong yes that's true.
SPEAKER_00 (38:40):
If you have if you give one more person the purge
box set of DVDs it is anincredible burden and I and I
apologize to all of our friendsthey're good movies.
I disagree they're too violent.
You've never even seen them yeahbut I've seen the trailer.
SPEAKER_01 (38:54):
No it's Abby get your shit together.
SPEAKER_00 (38:56):
Alan have you heard the saying Beyond the pale uh
yes do you know what it means?
SPEAKER_01 (39:01):
Beyond the pale is a reference to Jim Gaffigan's
first filmed stand-up routine.
SPEAKER_00 (39:08):
Close but off by a couple hundred years.
So beyond the pale today usuallymeans you've gone too far.
But its origins are actuallyIrish and date back to the
Middle Ages.
So the Pale was a region uh inDublin controlled directly by
English rule.
It was literally sort of likemarked off as this territory
(39:32):
right and so life quote unquotewithin the pale was thought of
as civilized and highbrow andaccording to like the English
standard and the English waywhile lands that were considered
outside of the pale were thoughtof as wild and dangerous and
Irish and beyond kind of likecontrol, right?
SPEAKER_01 (39:50):
Here be monsters.
SPEAKER_00 (39:51):
That's right.
So thus to go beyond the palewas to kind of cross this
boundary into territory that wasconsidered unruly.
Today it still means to cross aboundary but of course a less
literal one.
Strange history is all around usall the time.
There are so many more historicidioms that we still use today
(40:12):
that have evolved in meaning ofcourse over time.
And I think it's just reallyinteresting to look back and try
to understand what has stuck andwhat has been lost.
For instance in VictorianEngland people went around
saying no you're onions to eachother meaning to be very
knowledgeable or informed.
SPEAKER_01 (40:30):
And then some things like old phrases come back full
force, you know?
Like what?
Again to the other warning us ofthoughts.
And then it dips out of fashionfor hundreds of years and now
they are a scourge in society.
Again.
SPEAKER_00 (40:45):
Alan tell me what you think a thought is that
hottie over there so othersayings that were lost to time
don't sell me a dog which Don'tsell me a dog which meant don't
trick me.
And I've had some mild exposureto heavens to Betsy an
expression of shock and horrorfrom the 19th century but that's
(41:06):
kind of faded away by 2025.
I'll be there with bells onmeans I will be excited to come.
I'm enthusiastically acceptingin the 1950s teens would say
let's blouse if they wanted toleave and take a powder meant to
flee in the 1930s.
All in all there is wild phrasesall around us that maybe seem
(41:30):
random but you can traceanything back if you have
Wikipedia.
SPEAKER_01 (41:35):
So to take a powder uh is reference to having a
smoke bomb that you would throwand then you could just escape.
SPEAKER_00 (41:42):
Is that true?
SPEAKER_01 (41:43):
Like Batman.
SPEAKER_00 (41:44):
Where did you learn that?
Is that from Reddit?
SPEAKER_01 (41:46):
Uh if it's from Pliny the Elder I just his blog
is amazing.
That's right.
SPEAKER_00 (41:50):
Well Alan thank you for uh being here with me today
and I guess I should haverealized you would know all this
and it wouldn't be thatinteresting too but it was
interesting to me.
Yeah you knew a lot of them Iknew a few I'm surprised you
knew about the curtain thing fortaking a bow or for breaking
breaking a leg.
SPEAKER_01 (42:07):
And then you said I was wrong.
SPEAKER_00 (42:09):
Yeah well sometimes I want to keep keep you on your
toes.
SPEAKER_01 (42:11):
Okay.
SPEAKER_00 (42:12):
As always thank you guys so much for being here and
listening.
I hope you will take a momentnext time to look up a a a
saying that's being used in aconversation and you don't know
what the origin is.
Okay.
Talk to you soon.
Bye bye
Hello, everybody, and welcome back to another
episode of the Lunatics RadioHour Podcast.
My name is Abby Branker, and Iam sitting here with Alan Kudan.
SPEAKER_01 (00:28):
Hello.
SPEAKER_00 (00:29):
We as humans use a lot of different sayings and
idioms and expressions in oureveryday conversations.
And sometimes the roots of thoseexpressions are quite dark.
SPEAKER_01 (00:42):
Name one.
SPEAKER_00 (00:43):
And the origins have sort of been lost to history.
SPEAKER_01 (00:46):
Like what?
SPEAKER_00 (00:47):
Mad as a hatter, pulling my leg, saved by the
bell.
SPEAKER_01 (00:51):
That was a TV show.
SPEAKER_00 (00:52):
Among other things.
SPEAKER_01 (00:54):
Uh, what was the actor who played Screech who got
arrested?
SPEAKER_00 (00:57):
Justin Diamond?
He passed away.
SPEAKER_01 (01:00):
From what?
SPEAKER_00 (01:00):
From lung cancer.
SPEAKER_01 (01:02):
Oh no.
SPEAKER_00 (01:03):
Yeah.
It's kind of a sad story.
SPEAKER_01 (01:04):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (01:05):
Did I ever tell you that I met Mr.
Belding one time?
SPEAKER_01 (01:08):
Who's that?
SPEAKER_00 (01:08):
Mr.
Belding, the principal fromSaved by the Bell.
SPEAKER_01 (01:12):
Oh, uh no, this has never come up organically in
conversation.
SPEAKER_00 (01:15):
So the actor, obviously, Dennis Haskins,
showed up.
So let me take you through my myorigin story a little bit.
SPEAKER_01 (01:23):
So there you are in Tinder.
unknown (01:25):
No.
SPEAKER_00 (01:25):
Hoffshow where I went to college has these they
don't anymore, but they hadthese crazy bars when I was
there where you had to show IDto be 18 or have a student ID to
enter, and they wouldessentially give you beer for
free.
It was like penny beer nights.
The whole thing was crazy.
But one night, Mr.
Building came to one of thosebars to like meet college girls,
which was gross.
SPEAKER_01 (01:46):
But was he casting for a new season?
unknown (01:49):
None.
SPEAKER_00 (01:50):
As we love to trace back the history of anything and
everything on this podcast,today we are going to talk about
everyday sayings that actuallyhave quite horrifying origins.
Today's sources we have a mentalfloss article, Eight Common
Phrases with Surprisingly DarkOrigins, by Michelle Debzak, an
MPR article by Scott Simon, Whatis the origin of the word
(02:12):
deadline?
An exploration of its etymology,a historyextra.com article, Why
Do We Say Run Amok, the OxfordEnglish Dictionary, and this
very fun website calledPhraseFinder, which was created
by someone named Gary Martin.
It's a super fun website, andI'm going to link it, of course,
in the description of thisepisode, along with our sources.
Starting off with one of myfavorite examples.
(02:34):
People say mad as a hatter, as asynonym for somebody who is
insane or acting insane orcrazy, you know, quote unquote.
But the term refers to actualhatters, people who made hats,
especially people who made felthats.
SPEAKER_01 (02:48):
Why?
SPEAKER_00 (02:48):
Because hatters used to use mercury nitrate in the
felting process, which we nowknow causes serious issues when
humans are exposed to it in aprolonged capacity.
For example, it can cause bothspikes in aggression and mood
swings.
But more seriously, it can causetremors, shakes, issues with
speech, and even confusion andhallucinations.
(03:11):
Sometimes Lewis Carroll's Alicein Wonderland is cited as the
origin for this term.
SPEAKER_01 (03:16):
But that's false.
SPEAKER_00 (03:17):
It is false.
It is not true.
SPEAKER_01 (03:18):
It's because hat makers used to use mercury.
SPEAKER_00 (03:22):
Uh but uh the the this is saying that the term is
was first used as a term.
SPEAKER_01 (03:28):
Wait, why are they using what did the mercury do?
SPEAKER_00 (03:31):
It was used to make fur pelts easier to felt through
this process that was calledcarroting.
SPEAKER_01 (03:36):
Wow.
Yeah.
I've always felt that my peltsare too stiff.
Maybe I'll just bring them withme into my nightly mercury bath.
SPEAKER_00 (03:42):
That's right.
That's a great idea.
Two birds, one stone.
Oh, another saying that I didn'tlook up.
So the term Mad as a Hatter forthe record already existed
before Lewis Carroll wrote Alicein Wonderland.
That was not the first use ofit.
Historian Christopher Hillclaimed that a man from the 17th
century named Roger Crabinspired Carroll's Mad Hatter
character.
It's debated whether or not thisis true, but it's so
(04:04):
interesting.
We're gonna take a little miniside quest anyway.
We do know that Crab was born in1621 and died on September 11th,
1960.
Crabbe was many things,including a soldier, an
herbalist, a writer, and abusinessman.
But one of the more interestingparts about him is that he also
was part of this like very nichereligious lifestyle group.
(04:26):
Essentially, he was somebody whobelieved he was Christian and he
believed that all pleasure wassin.
So he was what was known as aChristian vegetarian, meaning he
was part of a group that citedChristianity as a reason not to
eat animals.
He also became an asceticist,someone who abstained from world
pleasures.
So he was abstinent, he didn't,you know, whatever.
(04:47):
There was a list of things thathe abstained from because he
thought deriving any pleasurefrom life was sinful.
SPEAKER_01 (04:53):
I know all about ascetists.
SPEAKER_00 (04:55):
You do?
SPEAKER_01 (04:55):
Yep.
SPEAKER_00 (04:56):
Tell me more.
SPEAKER_01 (04:56):
I read Siddhartha.
SPEAKER_00 (04:58):
Oh, I haven't read that since like eighth grade.
What?
Why?
It's so good.
You how often do you read it?
It teaches you how to wait andhow to fast.
That's right.
Important lessons for eighthgraders.
So essentially, Crab was veganand abstinent, right?
Just like Siddhartha.
Eventually, he also willinglybecame a hermit because he felt
that any money was sinful.
(05:19):
But before that, before he gaveup his business, he was a
haberdasher and a hatter inChesham.
SPEAKER_01 (05:25):
What's a haberdasher?
SPEAKER_00 (05:27):
A haberdasher is somebody who deals clothing,
essentially.
Like a business owner who sellsclothing and makes clothing and
whatever.
SPEAKER_01 (05:36):
How come that term isn't ubiquitous today?
SPEAKER_00 (05:38):
I think it's a bit of a mouthful.
SPEAKER_01 (05:40):
What do they call them today?
SPEAKER_00 (05:41):
Clothesmakers, shop owners, tailors.
SPEAKER_01 (05:43):
I feel like those are very different things
though.
SPEAKER_00 (05:45):
Yeah, yeah.
Crab gained a reputation for hiseccentric behavior.
Some blamed this on an injurythat he had sustained in battle,
and we do know, right, thatbrain injuries can change your
personality.
But we also now know that if hedid indeed work with Mercury, it
could have had an impact on himas well.
Crab died at the age offifty-nine.
He's buried at StepneyChurchyard.
(06:07):
His gravestone says thefollowing quote Tread gently,
reader, near the dust, committedto this tombstone's rust, for
while 'twas flesh, it held aguest, with universal love
possessed, a soul that stemmedopinions tied, did over sex in
triumphs ride, yet separate fromthe giddy crowd, and paths
(06:29):
tradition had allowed.
Through good and ill reports hepassed, oft censored, yet
approved at last, wouldst thouhis religion know?
In brief 'twas this, to all todo, just as he would be done
unto.
So in kind, nature's law hestood, a temple, undefiled with
blood, a friend to everythingthat's good, the rest angels
(06:50):
alone can fitly tell.
Haste then to them and him, andso farewell.
I'm also not gonna say muchabout this because it is a
spoiler, but one of my favoritepodcasts of all time, S Town, is
worth a listen if you'reinterested in this topic at all.
S Town?
S Town.
SPEAKER_01 (07:09):
Is that Seattle?
SPEAKER_00 (07:10):
No, it takes place in the South, but it's it's
incredibly Sarasota.
No, in the middle south.
SPEAKER_01 (07:17):
Seattle?
SPEAKER_00 (07:19):
Alright.
Let's talk about riding shotgun.
SPEAKER_01 (07:22):
I know all about riding shotgun.
SPEAKER_00 (07:25):
Tell us.
SPEAKER_01 (07:26):
So it comes from the days of transporting things by
wagon.
SPEAKER_00 (07:30):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (07:30):
Because someone had to sit next to the driver with a
shotgun to stop like bandits andwolves and stuff.
SPEAKER_00 (07:35):
That's exactly correct.
SPEAKER_01 (07:36):
Yeah, okay.
Next one, please.
SPEAKER_00 (07:38):
Well, and also someone would sit there just as
a show of force.
Like they would hold theshotgun.
So literally the person in thepassenger seat would be holding
the gun like a security guard.
And sometimes they were, youknow, actually, of course, ready
to fire, but sometimes it waskind of like you'd be a a a
moving target if you didn't havea body in that seat.
SPEAKER_01 (07:56):
Well, yeah, because you you're just walking around
with the big Scrooge McDuckmoney signs all over your wagon.
SPEAKER_00 (08:02):
Exactly.
The saying all but disappeareduntil the 1920s and 30s when
Hollywood revived it with therise of the Western.
SPEAKER_01 (08:09):
That makes sense.
SPEAKER_00 (08:10):
Yeah.
I think that's an interestingone.
The term actually really becamepopular when newspapers started
using it.
And then another version wasshotgun messenger, but obviously
riding shotgun became the thingthat we say today when we want
to sit in the front seat of acar, but we don't want to drive.
SPEAKER_01 (08:25):
And how did that evolve from providing security
roadside to shotgunning a beer?
SPEAKER_00 (08:32):
It's actually not super clear where that has come
from.
The the articles online are sortof like, yeah, it's from the
mid-20th century when it waslikely popularized by college
students.
SPEAKER_01 (08:46):
So it is popularized by college students.
So we need to contact a college,like Oxford because they're
smart.
SPEAKER_00 (08:54):
Yeah.
Yeah.
It's a good research project.
Yeah.
We need to know.
If you're listening and you arean Oxford uh research fellow,
give us a ring.
The term pulling my leg comesfrom criminal slang.
SPEAKER_01 (09:07):
Speaking of slang, do you know what it stands for?
SPEAKER_00 (09:09):
No.
Do you?
SPEAKER_01 (09:11):
You c you can guess.
SPEAKER_00 (09:12):
It's something language.
SPEAKER_01 (09:14):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (09:15):
Silly language.
SPEAKER_01 (09:16):
Silly language, that's it.
Yeah.
It's street language.
SPEAKER_00 (09:19):
Oh, well, that makes sense.
So pulling my leg dates back tocriminal slang in the 18th and
19th century in England.
Something that it originally wasrelated to this act of like
tripping somebody as a way torob them.
Like literally, you know, likeyou would tug their leg to make
them stumble, and then you wouldtake their wallet or whatever.
Over time, though, as typicalwith these things, the violent
(09:41):
meeting evolved, and now it's,you know, as we know, it's kind
of like you're pulling my leg,you're tricking me, you're lying
to me, you're pulling one overon me.
There's another sort ofalternate origin which dates
back to the theater and thecircus.
SPEAKER_01 (09:55):
Uh no, that makes sense.
It originated in the Cirque dePaleg.
SPEAKER_00 (10:00):
That's good, Alan.
Uh again, very similarly in thisone, it it came from the act of
one performer literally pullingon someone's leg to trip them or
distract another performer,which seems pretty
mean-spirited.
SPEAKER_01 (10:14):
Why would they do that?
SPEAKER_00 (10:16):
And it kind of evolved into like a playful
teasing.
I don't know, maybe if you weretrying to look better than them
in the circus.
There's also an old Englishexpression that sort of means to
entangle somebody or hinder themin some way, metaphorically
extending to tricking or foolingsomebody.
So it's all, you know, thatone's pretty close.
That one you can kind of see thethrough lines to where we are
(10:36):
today.
SPEAKER_01 (10:37):
Thy grasp mine pantaloons.
SPEAKER_00 (10:40):
Okay, Alan, if you had to guess where kicking the
bucket came from, this one's alittle bit dark.
SPEAKER_01 (10:46):
Uh it's from hanging a pig in a barn.
SPEAKER_00 (10:48):
How do you know everything?
That's so crazy.
SPEAKER_01 (10:51):
How do you not know it?
SPEAKER_00 (10:52):
I spent so many hours researching this, and you
I could just sit down and servethese to you and you would know
them.
What a waste of my time.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (11:00):
100%.
SPEAKER_00 (11:01):
So the idiom to kick the bucket, which now of course
we use it to mean to die in kindof a callous way, like, oh,
Oscar kicked the bucket.
There's there's a few differenttheories behind it, but Alan is
right.
One of those, and the strongesttheory, involves animal
slaughter.
SPEAKER_01 (11:17):
I can't believe you've never strung up a pig.
SPEAKER_00 (11:20):
You've certainly never strung up a pig.
SPEAKER_01 (11:22):
You would know all these things if you just, you
know, grew up on like a dairyfarm or something.
SPEAKER_00 (11:27):
Don't even start with me.
One of our biggest fights as acouple is that Alan doesn't
believe that I grew up on thecountry's oldest dairy farm,
which I did.
It doesn't exist.
It does exist.
It still exists now.
SPEAKER_01 (11:40):
Cows aren't real.
SPEAKER_00 (11:41):
Okay.
So typically when you would killa pig, the animal would be hung
from a wooden beam, which wasalso known as a yoke or a
bucket.
So the bucket was not a bucketas we know it today.
Technically, it's a rafter.
Yeah, but okay.
And then as the poor creaturedied, as it I guess it was not
totally strung up before.
SPEAKER_01 (12:02):
Poor creature.
You don't know this, maybe it'sa criminal.
SPEAKER_00 (12:05):
It w the pig?
SPEAKER_01 (12:06):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (12:06):
It would often, you know, struggle and kick, of
course, against um the bucketbeneath it.
Okay, so we just looked this up.
So a beam bucket or a bucketbeam is this sort of custom-made
steel connection in woodconstruction, so in wooden
barns, which is when peoplewould be, you know, talking of
using this phrase.
There would have been woodenbarns.
As opposed to what?
(12:28):
And it transfers vertical loadfrom one wooden beam to another.
SPEAKER_01 (12:32):
What have you seen?
A not wooden barn.
SPEAKER_00 (12:33):
I've seen aluminum metal barns, certainly.
SPEAKER_01 (12:36):
I feel like that their boy, they're like hangers.
SPEAKER_00 (12:38):
Alright, well, we're splitting hairs.
So another theory points to aCatholic practice.
So this would involve a bucketof holy water, and it would be
placed at the feet of adeceased, and so visitors would
sort of sprinkle the water alongthe deceased for as part of like
a last last rites ritual.
(12:59):
But sometimes if the bucket wasaccidentally kicked, it was, you
know, bad omen, bad vibes.
SPEAKER_01 (13:05):
Was it on the bed or on the floor?
SPEAKER_00 (13:07):
It would be on the floor, but like if one of the
passerby, not the corpse kickedit, but if like uh someone came
in and got a little tooenthusiastic and kicked it as
they were walking around.
SPEAKER_01 (13:17):
Sorry, just this is like olden times.
And if the bucket is on the bedand you know, the quote unquote
corpse gets sprinkled and startstwitching a little bit, you're
like, oh no, it's haunted.
Quick, drive a spike throughtheir forehead.
SPEAKER_00 (13:30):
Quick, we have a horror movie.
SPEAKER_01 (13:31):
And definitely not someone who's just really
injured.
Quick, bury them alive.
SPEAKER_00 (13:36):
But despite all of that, it seems the much more
accepted version of the historyis the animal.
SPEAKER_01 (13:43):
Yeah, the bucket beam.
SPEAKER_00 (13:44):
All right, Alan, you know everything.
So tell us, do you know theorigin of taking it with a grain
of salt?
SPEAKER_01 (13:50):
No.
SPEAKER_00 (13:50):
Oh, I've stumped him.
This is one of the oldestphrases that we're going to talk
about today.
Taking it with a grain of saltdates back to ancient Rome.
The phrase's first known usedates back to Pliny the Elder's
Naturalis Historia from thefirst century AD.
Shout out to Pliny the Elder.
We have talked about Pliny fromtime to time on this podcast.
(14:13):
Most recently, and probably theat the most at length, was
during our dancing plague uhseries, The Dancing Plague from
1518, which still remains one ofmy favorite series.
SPEAKER_01 (14:24):
Pliny the Elder dropped some fat beats and
caused so many people to dance.
SPEAKER_00 (14:51):
Well, he really wasn't there.
He was he acted as a secondhandsource.
SPEAKER_01 (14:55):
No, he's like Banksy.
You never know where he'soperating.
SPEAKER_00 (14:57):
That's right.
He's still here today.
So back to taking it with agrain of salt, Pliny's use of
the term comes in the form of arecipe.
More specifically, an antidote,an anecdote to a poison.
Pliny wrote that the anecdoteshould be taken with a grain of
salt, which he claims will makethe poison less potent and make
the concoction easier toswallow.
(15:19):
So here's the a quote of thetranslated passage.
Quote, take two dried walnuts,two figs, and twenty leaves of
roux, pound them all togetherwith the addition of a grain of
salt.
If a person takes this mixturefasting, he will be proof
against all poisons for thatday.
End quote.
SPEAKER_01 (15:39):
That's false.
That is pure anaphylaxis.
SPEAKER_00 (15:42):
Well, you are indeed allergic to some of those
ingredients.
The saying became a metaphorover time.
Instead of using salt to lessenthe intensity of a poison, the
saying, as we know, now impliesthat we should reduce the
meaning or validity of what weare about to hear, which I don't
know.
I feel like that's a prettysimilar evolution.
Of all the kind of sayings andhow they've evolved that we're
(16:05):
going to talk about today, thatone's pretty clear.
SPEAKER_01 (16:07):
Sure.
SPEAKER_00 (16:07):
It went from literal to metaphorical.
SPEAKER_01 (16:10):
Okay.
SPEAKER_00 (16:11):
Saved by the bell.
So the phrase saved by the bell,Alan, do you know what it's
from?
SPEAKER_01 (16:16):
Yeah, it's from the TV show.
SPEAKER_00 (16:18):
So there's two different paths.
One is that it's often kind ofthought of and associated with
boxing, right?
Where there was there's onefighter who's really down for
the count, he's not doing agreat job, and when the bell
rings and the round ends, it'skind of a break for him, right?
So that's obviously like savedby the bell.
But there's folklore that datesback even further, connected to
(16:39):
a phrase that's a little bitmore spooky in origin.
There was, which we've talkedabout many times on this show,
but there was this fear from theVictorian era of being buried
alive, so much so that theywould put bells above coffins
with strings, and the stringwould be around somebody's
finger.
So the idea was if somebody wokeup and they were buried
(17:01):
accidentally and they were stillalive, they could move their
hand and you would hear theringing of the bell and you
could save them before they gotbefore they died from being
buried alive.
SPEAKER_01 (17:11):
Well, that's pretty fun.
I thought you were gonna sayit's from executions where
somebody would be like, youknow, waiting in their cell and
they hear the bell tower in thedistance, and they're like, oh
whew, saved by the bell.
And then, you know, someonewould have to be like, I got
some bad news for you.
SPEAKER_00 (17:25):
I don't get why they would think that they were
saved.
SPEAKER_01 (17:27):
That that's a for whom the bell tolls reference.
SPEAKER_00 (17:30):
Oh, I've never read that.
SPEAKER_01 (17:32):
I I thought you were a literary major.
Ask not for whom the bell tolls.
It tolls for thee.
Did you even go to college?
SPEAKER_00 (17:40):
That's where I met Mr.
Belding.
This whole idea of like thebells outside of coffins and all
of the Victorian era paranoiaaround being buried alive is
loosely connected, right, tovampires.
To vampires.
Like literally to the origins ofwhere we get that mythology,
(18:03):
because people didn't quiteunderstand what happened in the
human body after it was buried.
And so if they would reopen agrave and see that somebody's
fingernails had grown or, youknow, bodily fluids had moved,
they would freak out and thinkthat that person was undead or
alive or whatever.
They had come alive after, youknow, or they weren't really
dead when they were buried.
(18:24):
So it's so fascinating, and weend up talking about this stuff
all the time.
All right, Alan, tell us theroot of the phrase caught
red-handed.
SPEAKER_01 (18:31):
I'm half remembering this.
It has something to do withbeing a pickpocket and when they
stole something, it was like ait was like a uh they would
leave a mark on their hands.
Like it would be like anentrapment type thing.
SPEAKER_00 (18:43):
Well, let's fact-check you.
The funny thing is, being caughtred-handed is actually quite
similar to what it means now.
Like it it originally also meantto be discovered in the act of
doing something wrong orillegal, especially in
connection to like being caughtwith like undeniable proof,
right?
That's kind of the whole pointof the saying.
So this phrase actually comesfrom medieval Scottish law.
(19:07):
So now we're talking about myancestors.
In medieval Scottish law, amurderer uh or a thief or any
kind of criminal would beconvicted only if they were
caught with the victim's bloodstill on their hands.
And we know that's from earlylegal texts from the 15th
century, which use the termred-handed to describe criminals
(19:27):
that were apprehended again withliteral visible blood marking
their guilt.
Of course, over time, thisphrase has evolved and it
doesn't just refer to like superviolent crimes anymore.
So there's a bit of a myth thatwe're gonna try to debunk around
the phrase rule of thumb, whichis often misidentified in its
origin.
So some people incorrectly saythat it comes from this old
(19:50):
British law that would allow aman to beat his wife with a
stick no thicker than his thumb.
SPEAKER_01 (19:56):
Yes.
SPEAKER_00 (19:57):
That's that's not true.
SPEAKER_01 (19:58):
100% true.
I learned that from BoondockSaints.
SPEAKER_00 (20:00):
That law never actually existed.
Sure it did.
I haven't seen Boondock Saintsin so long.
That was a firefight.
Wow, you're in rare form today.
So the real origin of rule ofthumb is far more boring, but we
love that it's not connected todomestic violence.
So different types ofcraftspeople or tradespeople
(20:23):
dating back to the 17th centuryoften sort of had to rely on
because there wasn't maybe theinvention of or widespread use
of rulers and things like that.
So they would kind of useapproximate measurements when
they were looking at the body,and the thumb was a convenient
and common reference point forlike a measurement.
SPEAKER_01 (20:44):
So the the whole beat your wife with a stick was
never a law.
It's more of just a guideline.
Because if it's small enough, itwould leave it wouldn't like
leave permanent damage.
SPEAKER_00 (20:57):
Yeah, but this this isn't where the the phrase is
from.
SPEAKER_01 (21:00):
It is because I learned all about it in Boondock
Saints.
SPEAKER_00 (21:03):
That's right.
And I forgot that that is ahistoric film.
This was also used by brewers.
So brewers would sometimes checkthe temperature of beer or ale
with the thumb rather than athermometer.
They kind of, you know, theycould feel it out.
SPEAKER_01 (21:18):
It reminds me of our famous story when uh my
grandfather was out to dinnerwith uh the rest of my family,
and he always loved getting hissoup.
He always ordered his soup ashot as the kitchen could
possibly make it.
Yeah.
Like scaldingly, scaldingly hot.
SPEAKER_00 (21:35):
A l lawsuit waiting to happen.
SPEAKER_01 (21:37):
It was a very common occurrence for him to send soup
back to be heated up.
And so one time a waitress hadbrought the soup back after
reheating it, and before sheeven put it down, my grandfather
said, That's not hot enough, youneed to send it back.
SPEAKER_00 (21:54):
Oh my god.
SPEAKER_01 (21:55):
And she's like, Sir, I don't mean to be rude, but you
haven't even tried it.
SPEAKER_00 (21:59):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (21:59):
And he says, Yeah, but your thumb's in it, so if it
was hot enough, you'd bescreaming.
SPEAKER_00 (22:05):
Oh.
What kind of soup would he eat?
SPEAKER_01 (22:08):
It doesn't matter.
He just loved soup.
SPEAKER_00 (22:10):
He loved soup.
You love soup too.
So, Alan, I just looked this up,and actually, that incorrect
domestic violence origin storydidn't appear until the 20th
century and has been repeatedlyproven wrong by historians.
SPEAKER_01 (22:24):
Technically the 21st century, because that's when
Boondock Sades came out.
SPEAKER_00 (22:27):
That's when it first appeared, I'm saying.
Alright, Alan, tell us aboutBreak a Leg.
SPEAKER_01 (22:31):
Break a leg comes from theater.
Uh the I mean sorry.
Break a leg has a few differentorigins.
It's one of those things thatcannot actually be confirmed.
But one of the most acceptedorigins is having to do with
theater where you come throughthe curtain, the bits of the
curtain are called legs.
(22:52):
So you are breaking a leg of acurtain by parting it to come
out.
SPEAKER_00 (22:56):
So as we all know, saying good luck to somebody
who's about to dance in front ofan audience or go on stage is
considered bad luck.
And instead, actors tend to saybreak a leg to each other.
The exact origin of this one isa little bit unclear.
There's two different theories.
So the first comes from thisidea of breaking the leg line,
which meant if someone broke theline of the curtain or the stage
(23:19):
border by stepping onto thestage, then they earned sort of
the role or they earned a bow.
That's what I said.
Yeah.
Others trace it to vaudevillewhen performers had hoped to do
so well that they wouldenergetically bend or break a
leg in repeated bows, right?
That they would sort of havebeen bowed, bowed to the point
(23:41):
of exhaustion because theyperformed so incredibly.
I'm just going to content warn.
This one is certainly dark andalso true crime-based.
So s feel free to skip ahead aminute or two if you'd like.
Alan, do you know where drinkingthe Kool-Aid comes from?
SPEAKER_01 (23:54):
I do.
SPEAKER_00 (23:55):
Tell us.
SPEAKER_01 (23:56):
From from Jim Jones and his great party hosting
abilities.
SPEAKER_00 (24:00):
Oh boy.
Drinking the Kool-Aid comes fromthe Jonestown cult murders from
November 18th, 1978, when JimJones led over 900 members of
the People's Temple to commitmass suicide by drinking a
flavored drink that was spikedwith cyanide, tranquilizers, and
other sedatives.
SPEAKER_01 (24:18):
It was actually not Kool-Aid.
SPEAKER_00 (24:20):
Correct.
Do you know what it was?
SPEAKER_01 (24:21):
Flavorade?
SPEAKER_00 (24:23):
That's right.
It's generally believed that itwas flavor aid and not Kool-Aid.
SPEAKER_01 (24:26):
Can you just be can you just imagine being on the
way out and then still beinglike, you know what?
We should get the discountversion of this.
SPEAKER_00 (24:35):
We're not even gonna splurge for so Kool-Aid is like
the the better version.
I didn't grow up on either, so Idon't know.
SPEAKER_01 (24:44):
That's right, because you grew up on the
world's oldest dairy farm.
SPEAKER_00 (24:47):
That's right.
That's a right.
I grew up on milk, on calcium.
The Jonestown settlement wasbased in Guyana.
So how did this horrifying eventinspire a commonplace saying?
This saying distills the essenceof the thing, really, meaning to
blindly follow a leader oranybody, going along with
something problematic withoutquestioning it enough.
(25:07):
It also has some similarities tothe old question, would you jump
off a bridge just becausewhoever told you to?
But drinking the Kool-Aid is notan amazing term to use, and I'm
certainly someone who's guiltyof it.
But in reality, Jones forced 900people, including kids, to take
their own lives.
It was a horrible tragedy.
Talking about horribletragedies, there is a phrase
(25:29):
that comes from the Civil War.
Do you know what phrase it is,Alan?
Okay.
Everything else is so easy foryou, so let's level it up.
SPEAKER_01 (25:37):
A phrase from the Civil War.
Is there any more context?
SPEAKER_00 (25:41):
The American Civil War.
Right.
You said this word, you said Iwas very good at this in our
vows, in your vows to me at ourwedding.
You said, And by God, you alwayshit your partner deadlines.
Meeting a deadline dates back tothe American Civil War in the
1860s, when a deadline markedthe territory or border of a
(26:03):
prison.
So kind of like this idea of anopen air prison where there was
a ditch or some sort of line inthe ground that marked the
boundary.
And if a soldier that wasimprisoned by the other side
crossed this line, they may beshot.
Hence the deadline.
SPEAKER_01 (26:17):
Do they yell?
You crossed a line, buddy.
SPEAKER_00 (26:20):
Or you missed the deadline, pal.
That's what they yell at you atwork nowadays.
Now it means, as we all know,the due date for something.
I think the evolution there isright.
It was like something that couldnot be missed, something that
was pivotal.
It was a deadline.
Alan, tell us do you know aboutbiting the bullet?
SPEAKER_01 (26:37):
I thought it was a suicide reference.
SPEAKER_00 (26:38):
Yeah, I think I thought that too, but it's not.
In today, in society today,people are often urged to bite
the bullet when they must dosomething that they really don't
want to do, right?
Just bite the bullet and go tothe grocery store.
I hate the grocery store.
SPEAKER_01 (26:55):
The ultimate human trial.
SPEAKER_00 (26:59):
So, right, today it's like, okay, you have to do
something annoying, you have to,you know, go through something
awkward, something you reallydon't want to do.
But hundreds of years ago, thiswas much more than something of
annoyance.
This was far more literal andfar more harrowing.
The expression is often trackedback to battlefield medicine
(27:21):
when hurt or wounded soldierswere subjected to surgery, and
of course they didn't have, youknow, painkillers or anesthesia
and things like that back then.
SPEAKER_01 (27:29):
They certainly did.
SPEAKER_00 (27:30):
Well, they weren't they didn't always have them on
the battlefield.
SPEAKER_01 (27:33):
In appropriate supply, but they certainly had
lots and lots of booze and tonsof opium.
SPEAKER_00 (27:40):
Sure.
But but but again, I'm sayingthat stuff existed, but maybe
not on every battlefield medicaltent.
SPEAKER_01 (27:46):
Right, yeah.
Not every operation had theappropriate tools.
Right.
So a lot of people had to gettheir like BBLs done without
proper anesthetic.
SPEAKER_00 (27:54):
A more popular depiction in film, good I'm
yeah, you know what BBL means.
A more popular depiction of thisin film is usually biting down
on a leather strap whensomething painful was about to
happen medically.
But a bullet was also an option.
SPEAKER_01 (28:09):
Why use a bullet?
It's gonna crack your tooth.
SPEAKER_00 (28:12):
Maybe that's what they had.
SPEAKER_01 (28:13):
They don't have a stick?
SPEAKER_00 (28:15):
So this improvised state.
SPEAKER_01 (28:16):
It literally grows on trees.
SPEAKER_00 (28:18):
Maybe if they're in a desert, they don't.
Or the tundra.
All right?
War is everywhere.
SPEAKER_01 (28:24):
But you're gonna bite a bullet, which is gonna
cover one side of your mouth andit's metal, so you can crack
your tooth.
SPEAKER_00 (28:30):
This improvised safeguard had two pros.
One to keep people fromscreaming and also from damaging
their tongues.
But historians have questionedthis origin story as much as you
are right now.
Because it's dumb.
Noting the absence of any sortof meaningful evidence and the
fact that military surgeonsusually carried leather straps
(28:51):
for this.
And again, as we've seen on TV.
SPEAKER_01 (28:53):
Get a wooden spoon.
SPEAKER_00 (28:54):
Oof.
What?
I don't like the taste of wood.
SPEAKER_01 (28:57):
You like the taste of metal more?
SPEAKER_00 (28:59):
No, leather strap is the best.
It's like jerky.
Another theory, and this is fromthis is actually a book that we
have in our bathroom, Allen.
SPEAKER_01 (29:09):
Oh, um, how to relax?
SPEAKER_00 (29:11):
In this 1976 volume, a classical dictionary of the
vulgar tongue, English writerFrancis Gross describes the
slang term nightingale, used forsoldiers who cried out while
while being publicly flogged orbeaten.
He noted that soldiers ofcertain regiments prided
themselves on stoically enduringpunishment and would quote, chew
(29:34):
a bullet, quote, to keep themfrom screaming out or yelling
out as they were getting beaten.
SPEAKER_01 (29:39):
I guess I guess it's kind of smart because if you
have a bullet between your teethand you get hit so hard that you
really chomp down on it and itmakes the bullet fire.
Maybe you can kill your yourattacker.
Oh, but no, because this is withlike ball and powder for like
muskets and shit, right?
Or do they use cartridges?
SPEAKER_00 (29:59):
In the 1700s, you tell me.
SPEAKER_01 (30:01):
1700s was absolutely like muskets and yeah.
So you'd have to also fill yourmouth with gunpowder.
SPEAKER_00 (30:08):
Hey, I'm sure it's been done.
SPEAKER_01 (30:10):
Rock and roll.
SPEAKER_00 (30:11):
Quoting from the Vulgar Tongue quote a soldier
who, as the term is, sings outat the Halberts.
It is a point of honor in someregiments.
the grenadiers never to cry outor become nightingales, whilst
under the discipline of the catof ninetales, to avoid which
they chew a bullet.
End quote.
Now, thankfully, both this very,very upsetting punishment and
(30:36):
uh, you know, the use of bitingdown on a thing during surgery
have been solved.
Those are not things that weoften run into, at least for
now.
So that's the good news.
Alan, what's the origin of thephrase hot shot?
SPEAKER_01 (31:15):
Hotshot?
Every reference to the termhotshot that I can think of is
modern.
SPEAKER_00 (31:21):
All right.
So a hotshot as we know ittoday, right?
How would you describe a hotshotas we would use that term right
now?
SPEAKER_01 (31:28):
A hot shot is when you add fire damage to your
attack because then you can poplead balloons.
SPEAKER_00 (31:33):
I would say that a hotshot is a phrase or a way to
describe somebody usually like ayounger kind of like overly
confident show off type of apeacock person.
They might rub people the wrongway around them because they are
kind of a successful show off.
SPEAKER_01 (31:49):
It's someone who's talented and not afraid to show
it.
SPEAKER_00 (31:51):
They're not humble.
But so this phrase started witha much more literal meaning as
they often do.
Hundreds of years ago a hot shotreferred to a cannonball that
was heated so much that itstarted to glow.
It was then fired into an enemyvessel and it would set it on
fire.
SPEAKER_01 (32:09):
What I tell you, you add fire damage to your attack.
SPEAKER_00 (32:11):
You were saying it from like a gameplay perspective
though and this is about thesame thing.
SPEAKER_01 (32:15):
Well it's not well it's not really it's at you
added to the pirate ship monkey.
SPEAKER_00 (32:19):
Who out there plays balloons?
Just us?
So these cannonballs were kindof kept warm on grates or like
in special furnaces over firesbecause they could very easily
turn gunpowder into flame.
So they were kind of verycarefully guarded and kept warm.
They also had to be like whenthey were actually shot into the
the thing the ship or thewhatever they were trying to set
(32:41):
on fire they had to be done ithad to be done with extreme
precision and very like precisemeasurements because it was so
flammable.
SPEAKER_01 (32:48):
So a lot of these ships had cats because they take
care of the mice?
Yeah.
They would have to like fight sohard to keep the cat away from
the warm cannonballs.
SPEAKER_00 (32:57):
Oh that's so cute.
Alan speaking of pirates andships do you know the origin of
the phrase show your truecolors?
SPEAKER_01 (33:07):
Uh yeah that's has to do with flying your flags.
So very oftentimes people woulddo false flag operations where
you put up the wrong flagbecause that was really the only
way to identify what a ship isis based off what flag they're
flying.
SPEAKER_00 (33:21):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (33:22):
So to show your true colors would be to show your
true flag.
SPEAKER_00 (33:25):
How would that work?
SPEAKER_01 (33:26):
What do you mean?
SPEAKER_00 (33:27):
They would have to take down the enemy flag the
fake flag and put up anotherflag.
SPEAKER_01 (33:31):
So say you're a smuggler, right?
Okay.
And you're trying to get stufffrom the Caribbean to Europe.
Uh you are going to have to gothrough so many different like
checkpoints?
Uh just different areas of waterthat are controlled by different
nations.
SPEAKER_00 (33:50):
Port of call.
SPEAKER_01 (33:51):
And so like one part is going to be friendly to
Spain.
One part is going to be friendlyto England one part is friendly
to France.
And it's part of your smugglerknowledge to know where you are
and what flag needs to be shownat what time and what flag would
get you shot immediately.
SPEAKER_00 (34:09):
Whoa, that's interesting.
But yeah you're totally right nonotes.
So let's talk about the phraseto turn a blind eye.
Of course today this means towillfully or knowingly ignore
something.
We know from the Oxford EnglishDictionary that this one dates
back to at least 1698, which isa bit contradictory because
(34:30):
generally the idiom is seen theidiom is thought to be inspired
by an event from 1801, theBattle of Copenhagen but we see
that it's been used you know inwritings from 1698.
Vice Admiral Horatio Nelson hadone blind eye.
When the signal came that sortof on the battlefield right that
alerted him to stop his attackhe claimed I really didn't see
(34:52):
the signal and he was kind oflooking through his one spy
glass and it became like okay hehas one eye but also he fucking
saw the signal.
He just didn't want to see thesignal.
SPEAKER_01 (35:02):
It's the uh the old timey equivalent of oh no you're
we're you're breaking up yeahthat's not even a thing anymore.
SPEAKER_00 (35:12):
Right.
The signals are too good now.
Well it's not true at all itjust doesn't make it it doesn't
make the noises anymore.
Yeah.
All right Alan since you're sosmart tell us about the phrase
to run amok.
SPEAKER_01 (35:23):
Uh to run amok is actually a more modern version
of another famous quotation fromPliny the Elder who was famous
for coining the phrase beware ofthoughts.
SPEAKER_00 (35:36):
Beware of thoughts?
Who taught you that?
Pliny the Elder You shouldn'twhatever websites you're on make
me nervous.
Today running amok perhapsrepopulated by the 1993 hit
Hocus Pocus is used to describesomeone who is out of control.
But the origins of this sayingare you just softballing the the
(35:56):
hit hocus pocus.
Yeah because that's like such afun little moment in that movie.
But the origins uh of course arequite different.
According to theHistoryExtra.com article Captain
Cook defined a muck in the 1770sas quote to get drunk with
opium, to sally forth from thehouse indiscriminately killing
and maiming villagers andanimals in a frenzied attack end
(36:19):
quote.
This is from his travels toMalaysia where this sort of fit
was often thought to be causedby this evil tiger spirit called
Hantu Belin which was believedto possess a person and sort of
drive them into this mad,murderous rampage.
Sadly this usually ended withthe possessed quote unquote
possessed person eithercommitting suicide or being
(36:41):
killed by others to stop themadness.
SPEAKER_01 (36:43):
So like I said it's just another way of saying you
gotta stay in control.
SPEAKER_00 (36:49):
That's right.
So this next one is darkcertainly because that's what
we're doing here but it alsokind of has a beautiful element
to it at the beginning.
SPEAKER_01 (36:57):
What is it?
SPEAKER_00 (36:58):
Do you know the origins of the phrase white
elephant?
SPEAKER_01 (37:01):
White elephant?
SPEAKER_00 (37:02):
Yeah.
Like you know as the holidaysapproach some of us may find
ourselves playing some versionof white elephant or Yankee
swap, but the phrase whiteelephant wasn't always in
reference to this game.
There's kind of a deeper origin.
SPEAKER_01 (37:16):
I do not know.
SPEAKER_00 (37:17):
According to the Oxford English Dictionary a
white elephant is quote apossession that is useless or
troublesome, especially one thatis expensive to maintain or
difficult to dispose of endquote.
SPEAKER_01 (37:30):
Unlike those gray elephants which are so much more
easy.
SPEAKER_00 (37:34):
Let me tell you why the white elephant came to be
thought of this way.
So the saying actually comesfrom Southeast Asia particularly
in modern day Thailand whiteelephants were considered sacred
and incredibly rare.
So giving one as a gift was agreat honor but it was way more
complicated than that.
Essentially because they were sosacred and rare white elephants
(37:58):
would not be used for labor.
SPEAKER_01 (38:08):
Sorry I just pictured an elephant in a little
nurse's outfit helping someonein labor.
SPEAKER_00 (38:13):
But refusing this gift or mistreating an elephant
was like unthinkable, right?
Because they were so sacred.
So if someone in power or wealthwanted to financially ruin
somebody else in a very passiveaggressive way, they would give
them this horrible burden ofthis very sacred white elephant.
SPEAKER_01 (38:30):
So gifts should be burdens no I that's your
takeaway?
I've been doing it right allalong yes that's true.
SPEAKER_00 (38:40):
If you have if you give one more person the purge
box set of DVDs it is anincredible burden and I and I
apologize to all of our friendsthey're good movies.
I disagree they're too violent.
You've never even seen them yeahbut I've seen the trailer.
SPEAKER_01 (38:54):
No it's Abby get your shit together.
SPEAKER_00 (38:56):
Alan have you heard the saying Beyond the pale uh
yes do you know what it means?
SPEAKER_01 (39:01):
Beyond the pale is a reference to Jim Gaffigan's
first filmed stand-up routine.
SPEAKER_00 (39:08):
Close but off by a couple hundred years.
So beyond the pale today usuallymeans you've gone too far.
But its origins are actuallyIrish and date back to the
Middle Ages.
So the Pale was a region uh inDublin controlled directly by
English rule.
It was literally sort of likemarked off as this territory
(39:32):
right and so life quote unquotewithin the pale was thought of
as civilized and highbrow andaccording to like the English
standard and the English waywhile lands that were considered
outside of the pale were thoughtof as wild and dangerous and
Irish and beyond kind of likecontrol, right?
SPEAKER_01 (39:50):
Here be monsters.
SPEAKER_00 (39:51):
That's right.
So thus to go beyond the palewas to kind of cross this
boundary into territory that wasconsidered unruly.
Today it still means to cross aboundary but of course a less
literal one.
Strange history is all around usall the time.
There are so many more historicidioms that we still use today
(40:12):
that have evolved in meaning ofcourse over time.
And I think it's just reallyinteresting to look back and try
to understand what has stuck andwhat has been lost.
For instance in VictorianEngland people went around
saying no you're onions to eachother meaning to be very
knowledgeable or informed.
SPEAKER_01 (40:30):
And then some things like old phrases come back full
force, you know?
Like what?
Again to the other warning us ofthoughts.
And then it dips out of fashionfor hundreds of years and now
they are a scourge in society.
Again.
SPEAKER_00 (40:45):
Alan tell me what you think a thought is that
hottie over there so othersayings that were lost to time
don't sell me a dog which Don'tsell me a dog which meant don't
trick me.
And I've had some mild exposureto heavens to Betsy an
expression of shock and horrorfrom the 19th century but that's
(41:06):
kind of faded away by 2025.
I'll be there with bells onmeans I will be excited to come.
I'm enthusiastically acceptingin the 1950s teens would say
let's blouse if they wanted toleave and take a powder meant to
flee in the 1930s.
All in all there is wild phrasesall around us that maybe seem
(41:30):
random but you can traceanything back if you have
Wikipedia.
SPEAKER_01 (41:35):
So to take a powder uh is reference to having a
smoke bomb that you would throwand then you could just escape.
SPEAKER_00 (41:42):
Is that true?
SPEAKER_01 (41:43):
Like Batman.
SPEAKER_00 (41:44):
Where did you learn that?
Is that from Reddit?
SPEAKER_01 (41:46):
Uh if it's from Pliny the Elder I just his blog
is amazing.
That's right.
SPEAKER_00 (41:50):
Well Alan thank you for uh being here with me today
and I guess I should haverealized you would know all this
and it wouldn't be thatinteresting too but it was
interesting to me.
Yeah you knew a lot of them Iknew a few I'm surprised you
knew about the curtain thing fortaking a bow or for breaking
breaking a leg.
SPEAKER_01 (42:07):
And then you said I was wrong.
SPEAKER_00 (42:09):
Yeah well sometimes I want to keep keep you on your
toes.
SPEAKER_01 (42:11):
Okay.
SPEAKER_00 (42:12):
As always thank you guys so much for being here and
listening.
I hope you will take a momentnext time to look up a a a
saying that's being used in aconversation and you don't know
what the origin is.
Okay.
Talk to you soon.
Bye bye
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