Wednesday WOLF - Everything But The Kitchen Sink

I've got a collection of random information in my brain that makes me an awesome Trivial Pursuit partner, but is completely useless when it comes to real world application. Like say, job applications. I thought I'd share some of this random crap with you in the form of another acronym-ific series. I give you - Word Origins from Left Field - that's right, the WOLF. Er... ignore the fact that the "from" doesn't fit.

You've probably heard the phrase everything but the kitchen sink, but did you ever wonder where it came from? Even though the phrase gained a lot of popularity post WWII, it was in use before that as a common enough idiom to be referenced in newspapers. That particular phrase originally referred to when people moved to a different household, often stripping down their current residence, taking any and everything with them they could carry. Doors and carpets often walked out the door, but kitchen sinks were made of porcelain then - heavy, awkward, and not to mention hooked up to the pipes. Therefore, the phrase came to be used as a reference to a very thorough, wall-to-wall, all-encompassing, no holds barred brand of everything.

So... because I'm a bit of a geek (OK, a huge bit of a geek), my geek-brain worked away at this and came out of it thinking thus -- plumbing is often called waterworks, so what if "the works" came about in connection with the kitchen sink reference to mean everything?

Eh? What say you?

Wednesday WOLF - Brouhaha

I've got a collection of random information in my brain that makes me an awesome Trivial Pursuit partner, but is completely useless when it comes to real world application. Like say, job applications. I thought I'd share some of this random crap with you in the form of another acronym-ific series. I give you - Word Origins from Left Field - that's right, the WOLF. Er... ignore the fact that the "from" doesn't fit.

So, my English speaking friends are probably aware that pigs say "oink," sheep go "baa," and horses are known for their "neigh." But did you know that animals sound different in other languages? In French, for example, the dog says, "Ouaf! Ouaf!" and the pig says, "Groin! Groin!" (I'm resisting a VMA joke, b/c my mom wants me to work on being nicer).

What does this have to do with brouhaha? Well, a brouhaha is generally used to describe a noisy and / or angry situation, not to be confused with hubbub, because the latter can be positive. A brouhaha is a bad thing, and well... so's the Devil, right? The best explanation for brouhaha that I was able to run down is that it was often used as a noise that the devil made in French stage-dramas. As in "brou, ha ha!" Apparently this was a French version of an evil laugh.

Wednesday WOLF - Dressed to the Nines

I'll be going on tour soon and I'd like to be dressed to the nines - but... what the hell does that mean? Well, great question. I can't find a really satisfactory answer. What being dressed to the nines means is that you are dressed very nicely, decked out for a certain occasion. But that's pretty much where everyone stops agreeing about this particular phrase.

One theory is that it's a bastardization of the pronunciation of being dressed to thine eyes, but I personally  can't really see how being dressed right up to your eyeballs looks good on anyone. Certainly not enough for it to have slipped into a misheard common usage.

Another origin tossed about frequently for this phrase claims roots in the fantastically sharp uniforms worn by the 99th Lanarkshire Regiment of Foot, which was raised in 1824. They were all brass buttons and fire-engine-red wool. And while I'm sure they were damn sexy, most people can't help but point out that there's a pretty big difference between 9 and 99.

The best answer I could come up with is that the number 9 has always been viewed as a mystical number. It is viewed as the number of perfection, with many religious connotations and literary references sprinkled all over the place. To me, this answer makes the most sense. Because to say, "Wow, she's dressed to perfection," makes more sense than, "Wow! She's dressed up to her eyes. Well, what I mean to say is that she looks as good as an nineteenth century British foot soldier."