Good Night, Nurse!

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Alice, over at Finslippy, just posted about one of my very favorite prompts fromNo One Cares What You Had for Lunch. It’s about bringing back beloved words that no one uses any more. A few of my favorites pulled from her comments section:

Cinchy, meaning easy to do.
Fie as a curse word.
“I’m all sixes and sevens,” meaning “off my game.”
Poppycock, as an expression of disbelief.
“I’ve got a hitch in my git-along,” meaning “I feel stiff.”
Zozzled, meaning drunk.

What words do you adore?

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88 thoughts on “Good Night, Nurse!”

  2. Dungarees, for jeans.
    Going jukin’ (to hit the town).
    Glad rags, the clothes you go jukin’ in.
    Copacetic.

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  3. It used to CRACK ME UP when my mother would say “dungarees” when I was a child. I’d beg her to keep saying it. I frequently use “poppycock”, which is either met with a laugh or an eyebrow.

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  4. 1. Cat’s Ass – as in, “Check her out. Doesn’t she think she’s the cat’s ass!” I think it originated as someone’s own take on Cat’s Pajamas. It’s also going to be the name of my own blog when I finally get out of the edit suite long enough to set it up.
    2. Paint the Town Red – aka Going Jukin’

    P.S. Loved your book.
    P.P.S. Sent the link to your radio interview to a few of my clients who don’t understand the popularity, and therefore the need, of blogs.

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  6. golly, sarah – you’ve pilfered my fave – gobsmacked it is!
    Dreamy.
    And lately a good friend mocked me for taking to exclaiming ‘good heavens’ much in the same way I once exclaimed, ‘fuckin A!’. My children are loud and indiscreet, what can I say – oh mother of invention??
    Oh yeah. My point.
    Also-hooch…it’s a great word all-around.
    Anyone remember (70’s, I think)
    POSSLQue?
    I do.

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  8. personally, i adore, and am often taunted fo saying,”heavens to betsy”, “goodness!”, and “holy kamoley”. i think i may be 80 years old and stuck in the body of a 33-year-old. oh well.

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  9. I have the habit of uttering the phrase “Peachy keen, jelly bean” entirely too often. But I just can’t help myself!

    Oh, and I say “prolly” a lot, instead of probably.

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  10. After a recent trip to PA, I introduced my husband to “I don’t cotton to” (as in,”I don’t cotton to no polyester bell bottoms”). Now we frequently shock our friends with our utter lack of hipness and poor grammar.

    I am also partial to “lands!” as an excited utterance a la “good heavens”. And to steal a fave of a friend of mine from NC, it’s always good to say one is “seein’ rats” when angry.

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  11. I meant to comment over at finslippy, but I didn’t quite get around to it. I’ve always liked “tight” for drunk.

    I’m living in NC and just today I heard a local friend of mine say “I’d be all over that like a drunk on free peanuts!”

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  12. My favorites:

    “It’s like chasin’ a rat through hell for an ear of corn!” — long winded one from my father, meaning an exercise in futility.

    “Red up your room!” — A peculiar one from my mother meaning to clean your room… I didn’t realize this one wasn’t ordinary ’till I got to college and realized that I was raised by rednecks, albeit highly intelligent ones.

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  15. My father-in-law uses “Good night, nurse!” on a regular basis. Love it.
    I also like “It’s tits!” for when something is really great.

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  16. Um, Hannah…I grew up in Alabama. Despite the fact that I am an educated professional, I still say “right quick” and “fixin’ to” on a regular basis. Usually to the great entertainment of my co-workers. Another favorite of mine (which usually pops out when I am exhausted and irritated and can’t cuss) is “Y’all quit!” To get the appropriate effect, “quit” should have at least two syllables and be REALLY dragged out.

    As for my favorite out-of-favor words, “knickers” would have to be it. As in, “don’t get your knickers in a twist.”

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  17. I am Australian so there are tons that you would just not get (unless of course you can catch Kath and Kim which is well worth it), but my favourites are:
    Parlarva – as in a hassle/mess
    Dogs Breakfast – as in mess
    “Not Happy Jan” – when something annoys you (from a long running ad on TV)
    Goog – as in “as full as a goog” meaning as full as an egg)(cannot get anything else into an egg)

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  19. “duh!”, and it’s 4th-grade-cousin “doy!”

    Preferably said while waving finger at head in a circular motion.

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  21. A few favorites…

    Davenport: what my grandma calls a sofa
    Gridlock: it’s so 22nd century!
    Harpy: a handy word to describe a few choice people
    Kakistocracy: a government of the worst men

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  22. I asked my mother if she remembered the famous movie star, Rock Hudson, who died of AIDS.

    She said, “Oh yeah. He could put his slippers under my bed anyday!”

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  23. When I remember – while frustrated or angry – that I’m trying to curse less, I say, “For the luvva mud” or “Judas!”

    “Well, harrumph” (actually saying the word, not just making the noise) is a good expression of minor-league disgust.

    I prefer to call idiot drivers clowns, rather than dumbshits.

    This one I picked up from my dad: “Well, that’s just grand” means exactly the opposite.

    When I’m walking the dog and in a bit of a hurry, I frequently tell her, “Cezanne, I have no time for your canine lollygaggin’.” Almost as good is “canine foolishness.”

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  24. I like saying:

    “Like Fudge” (as in, not bloody likely). I thank The Simpsons for that quote.

    I’m Australian too, so I use the word “Tukker” for ‘food’. Basically, anything Steve Irwin said; I probably have too.

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  25. My grandfather used to keep us in line by reminding us if we misbehaved we’d get a “lickin’.” He’d also correct himself if caught in the act of “cussin'” in front of us by drawling out “sugar” in place of sh!t.” Not to give the wrong impression, or anything, because he was really a soft-spoken person not given to “hollering.”

    My Grandmother once “felled” me in laughter by using the word “boner” in a sentence. She was a child of the great depression, and during her youth this rendition of the slang apparently meant “mistake” rather than the current usage — interesting entymological evolution, THAT!

    It’s not that my family was so folksy — on the contrary, but as children of immigrants they were both “keen” on having grandkids whose use of the language was “super-duper.” They thought that improper speech reflected a “numbskull” education, and though they never did actually “smack us upside the head” they did threaten to “knock us into next week” if we didn’t apply ourselves.

    Of course, “duh!,” if you “figure in” all the Yiddish that peppered their speech, you can pretty much imagine how “dopey” my brother and I sounded! We were like half “squeeky-clean” Leave-it-to-Beaver types (a few decades after it was “mod”) and half “rumpled” little old “noodniks” who hadn’t a clue that none of our peers had any concept of what a “shmata” was. Of course, today, “shmata” is universal, and pluralism has put the “kibbosh” on “nixing” anything vaguely ethnic.

    Wow, Maggie! This exercise was certainly “better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick!” I know I “got a kick” out of the other comments! Think your idea is all “nines!”

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  26. What about kitty corner?
    Or completely unrelated, how about hussy?
    And for that matter, two-bit. What ever happened to two-bit?
    WOAH and maybe PSYCH! should come back, as well.

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  27. In place of ‘not as stupid as you look’:
    “Not as green as you’re cabbage-looking”

    For full effect, must use a Scottish accent!

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  28. I’ve never heard the phrase ‘I’ve got a hitch in my git-along’ before. That’s hilarious.

    That one definitely needs to make a comeback (or perhaps an introduction in my part of the world)

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  30. If I had my druthers…
    When things go pear-shaped…
    Holy Toledo (or Mergatroid, sp?)!
    Pardon?
    I’m a huge fan of “bitchin'”, “far out”, and “knackered” as well.
    However, I am so glad people don’t say “random” anymore. It seems like there was a day when all of a sudden people started to say, “you’re so random” and “that was random” as though they had been saying it all along.

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  31. “Fiddlesticks” is a good one…I picked that up when I got in trouble for cussing around younger kids.

    I also fancy “gobsmacked.” And “fancy.”

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  32. If you’ve spent enough time in Wisconsin you may note people end statements with “and, so.”
    “heavens to betsy” was a grandmother thing.
    If you can look back at the 80’s as the olden days, then ‘Gaylord’ still does it for me. A friend of mine worked in an office where the IT guy had named the 2 server printers “Dorkus” and “Malorkus”.

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  33. Having lived all over the south, I have heard and used too many to mention here, but a few favorites are:

    Nabs – Any nabisco cracker or the crackers you get in packages out of vending machines

    Shit and fall back in it – As in “If he doesn’t like it, he can shit and fall back in it”.

    Sons of Bitches – with emphasis on the extra “s”

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  34. The current favourite?

    “Going off like a frog in a sock” – meaning something is fantastic, the place was packed, it was ‘going off’.

    “Far out brussel sprout”

    “Having a Barry” (as in having a shocker – playing on a bit of an Australian icon Barry Crocker – i.e. – having a Barry Crocker shocker.)

    “Mutton dressed as lamb” – for older women trying to look young

    …to list just a few!

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  35. I like to say “easy on the eyes” about highly attractive people.

    My dear, departed friend Mickey used to use 2 old-fashioned expressions which always cracked me up, because he abbreviated them. He would say “I wouldn’t give him the t.o.d.” Time of Day.

    Or he would motion with his head toward someone and say “g.h.!” meaning “Get Her!” meaning “Check her out, she thinks she’s all that and a side of fries!”

    I miss him.

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  39. I love some of the old slang from old Looney Tunes cartoons:

    “What a maroon!” (I inferred from the context that a maroon is a fool/rube of some sort)
    and
    “You MASHER!” (said to a gentleman trying to get fresh with a woman)

    I’d love to see “jalopy” come back as slang for old beater cars, too! I remember that Archie in the Archie comics drove a jalopy.

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  40. I started a campaign a couple years back to bring back the monikers “muttonhead” and “lunkhead.” I had a modicum of success for a while at work, but the campaign fizzled….

    Can you imagine what a wonderful world it would be if we all used the word muttonhead in a sentence each and every day?

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  41. My very best friend says the following, which I like very much…

    “Yea, verily…”, as in, “That was a good dinner.”
    “Yea, verily.”

    And, “I don’t know, but I’ve been told, the streets of heaven are paved with gold.” That’s more than one word, but nice to say when you actually don’t know something.

    Personally I use, “Okey dokey” a lot. And I do miss being able to the word “gay”, as in meaning happy or fun.

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  43. Oh… “persnickety” – I love that word.

    Also, my little southern belle grandmother used to call me “Sookie” when I was misbehaving, as in “Listen, Sookie…”

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  45. My grandmother will say, “Boy, she’s a real swinger!” And no, she does not mean a swinger swinger. It just means that she’s “wild”.

    My 68 y.o. MIL law used the expression “rode hard and put away wet” to describe someone. It just sounds so dirty.

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  48. Thought of another one,
    my grandmother used to use the word “rounder” to describe someone who is wild, or gets around.

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  50. I still use “yowza!” when something surprises me, and have accused my kids of “lollygagging” more than once.

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