Speaker 1: Fellow ridiculous historians. We're back with another classic episode. This
Speaker 1: is a follow up to our legendary Idiomatic for the
Speaker 1: People Too Part one. This is Idiomatic for the People
Speaker 1: to Part two, which we thought was just an amazing
Speaker 1: inside joke we did and it was.
Speaker 2: We stand by it.
Speaker 3: If anyone's not familiar with the incredible Athens, Georgia based
Speaker 3: you know Indie well, they became huge mega rock stars,
Speaker 3: but they originally were kind of like heroes of the
Speaker 3: early indie rock kind of scene. Rim Automatic for the
Speaker 3: People is the name of one of their biggest albums
Speaker 3: and is named after a really amazing soul food restaurant
Speaker 3: in Athens, Georgia called Weaver Dies and their slogan was
Speaker 3: whatever it means, Automatic for the People. Sadly that spot
Speaker 3: recently closed and as long as I've been going to
Speaker 3: Athens and even living there, I'd never been until very
Speaker 3: recently and then they closed and it was awesome have
Speaker 3: squash casserole delicious And speaking of awesome, we have a
Speaker 3: lot of fun with this one, Max, I think it
Speaker 3: was a little bit before.
Speaker 1: Your time maybe, so we had talked previously when we
Speaker 1: aired part two. Part one still hilarious. We had talked
Speaker 1: about re resurrecting this series with more idioms and things
Speaker 1: for the etymology nerds. Max, would you be on board
Speaker 1: to hop on mic with us for a gritty reboot?
Speaker 1: You know I would all right good, because it'd be
Speaker 1: awkward if you said no. Anyway, let's roll the tape.
Speaker 1: Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio, and we've returned
Speaker 1: in an earlier episode we launched our continuing exploration into idioms.
Speaker 1: This is the next episode of Idiomatic for the people.
Speaker 2: Come on knock Idiomatic for you something something bad people
Speaker 2: and phrases and we got to work shop that.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 4: No, Ben.
Speaker 2: You pointed out though, that the Three's company theme kind
Speaker 2: of dirty, clearly.
Speaker 1: Not as innocent as the melody would imply. And this
Speaker 1: is something that we we should look back into because
Speaker 1: I know that you and I and our super producer
Speaker 1: Casey Pegram had a fantastic time tripping the light of
Speaker 1: music history in our Louis Louis episode, So maybe we
Speaker 1: can look at theme songs one day.
Speaker 2: Are you trying to make trip the Light happen? Ben?
Speaker 1: No, But I was thinking about making cast the pod fantastic.
Speaker 5: That could be a whole thing.
Speaker 3: We hear voices. Hear these voices. Man, We've got voices,
Speaker 3: that's right. Are not just the ones in our heads?
Speaker 1: No, no, it's not just you and Casey myself. Today
Speaker 1: we are rejoined by our good friends Ruin Newby and
Speaker 1: Frank mulheran. Hey, mahallo, guys, thanks thanks for is that
Speaker 1: a well hello or a mahallow?
Speaker 5: Both?
Speaker 2: Okay?
Speaker 1: With that multifunctional so we are. We're really glad that
Speaker 1: you guys didn't didn't give up the ghost. It's another
Speaker 1: idiom didn't give up the ghost at intermission and came
Speaker 1: and came back. So thanks so much for giving us
Speaker 1: a second date. We've established the rules videomatic for the
Speaker 1: people already. I almost tapped out myself, Ben. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: you've been You've had a long day, my friend.
Speaker 2: It's been a long journey.
Speaker 3: I was telling the superducer Casey Pregram, that I did
Speaker 3: get good sleep last night. I went to bed like
Speaker 3: a good boy around nine. We'll go bet four thirty.
Speaker 3: But it's not about the lack of sleep, but just
Speaker 3: about the length of the day. We are up at
Speaker 3: four it feels like an eternity, but I'm kind of
Speaker 3: liking this.
Speaker 2: Punchy vibe that I'm riding now. I'm hoping that it'll
Speaker 2: lend itself to some fun idiomatic dissection.
Speaker 1: I am one hundred percent agreed with you, and I've
Speaker 1: just been struck by inspiration. Noel, will you be the
Speaker 1: first brave soul to explore an idiom with us today?
Speaker 3: I would love to ben jamn. My idiom is the
Speaker 3: name of a spice girl? Can you guess which one
Speaker 3: it is?
Speaker 1: Is it scary?
Speaker 5: The story?
Speaker 2: The story is a little bit scary. It does involve
Speaker 2: some sport, some potential sports, some sports individual sporty individuals.
Speaker 1: It's a baby.
Speaker 2: What are the other ones? There's baby baby? There may
Speaker 2: be some babies in the story.
Speaker 1: Sure, there's baby spice. Gingerne Ginger spice.
Speaker 5: Was she ginger spice?
Speaker 4: Or she was?
Speaker 2: Wasn't she?
Speaker 1: There was ginger spices?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 5: Ginger is a spice? I think? Is what you mean?
Speaker 2: Ginger is a spice multiple levels.
Speaker 3: Yeah, the story of the spice girl in question, or
Speaker 3: at least her namesake, does involve some spices potentially, Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2: Aha. It involves a journey to India to the land
Speaker 2: of exotic spices, right, like turmeric, like you know, peppercorns, peppercorns,
Speaker 2: that's right, that's right. But it's not just any journey,
Speaker 2: my friend. It is the journey of the wealthy via
Speaker 2: steam ship.
Speaker 3: You see, in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century,
Speaker 3: it was the thing to do for the well to do,
Speaker 3: the wealthy, the upper crust of England to go to
Speaker 3: India for what they call in England holiday, which means
Speaker 3: vacation h or. It's also a fabulous Madonna song.
Speaker 2: Wouldn't that be funny?
Speaker 1: She was.
Speaker 3: There's a Go Go song called vacation and then there's
Speaker 3: a Madonna song called holiday, and they're both. You know,
Speaker 3: Madonna's talk about holiday is about taking a holiday, if
Speaker 3: we took a holiday, just sometime to celebrate.
Speaker 2: Now, I think she's more talking about like a Christmas
Speaker 2: type experience. Sure, she's talking about celebrating.
Speaker 6: Well, as long as you wake me up before you go.
Speaker 2: Go, oh, you know, I will ruin you.
Speaker 3: You know, I will listen, hear listen here my friends.
Speaker 3: So they have to take this journey on steamship. And
Speaker 3: here's the thing. In those days, it was not a
Speaker 3: good look for the wealthy to have a tan because
Speaker 3: the tan was not what it is today. Or people
Speaker 3: you know, get literally spray painted on their bodies so
Speaker 3: they look they have that like glow. No, that was
Speaker 3: the look that was reserved for like a field hand,
Speaker 3: that was considered like we would call like a redneck
Speaker 3: or something like that, someone that was like the lowest
Speaker 3: of the low. And these these wealthy types wanted to
Speaker 3: maintain their ghostly complexion. So here's the thing, the story
Speaker 3: of the word posh.
Speaker 2: That is my work. It was a long preamble to
Speaker 2: get there. I know. But Ben, you know I love
Speaker 2: a good acronym.
Speaker 1: That's true.
Speaker 3: You know you know this about me, Frank, you know
Speaker 3: this about me. I'm always talking about acronyms. I won't
Speaker 3: shut up. I'm like acronym, acronym, acronym. Yet I can't
Speaker 3: seem to think of.
Speaker 2: Radar race car.
Speaker 5: That's it's a palindrome, not an acronym.
Speaker 1: I just want to chime in here. One of my
Speaker 1: favorite palindromes doctor awkward, really wow beautiful.
Speaker 6: Also one of my favorite Spider Man villains. No wait, ac,
Speaker 6: I know my favorite is a lonely tail and all wow,
Speaker 6: that's a good one. Yeah, but palindromes may be something
Speaker 6: for a different tale, right, you.
Speaker 2: Know, the word palindrome is itself a palindrome. I'm pretty
Speaker 2: sure other language that's fair.
Speaker 3: So I'll tell you the story of the word posh
Speaker 3: is really fascinating because there is a popularly circulated, let's
Speaker 3: call it, I don't know, a rumored origin of this
Speaker 3: word that these mucky muck English types that were going
Speaker 3: on their holiday to India thea steamship required a very
Speaker 3: particular type of seat so they would not get that tan.
Speaker 3: So they wanted to sit in the part of the
Speaker 3: ship that would shield them from the afternoon sun, which
Speaker 3: is the hottest of the hot during the day when
Speaker 3: you're out on the open sea, which would, according to
Speaker 3: this version of events, be the right or the starboard side.
Speaker 3: And then when you came back, they wanted it to
Speaker 3: be on the left or the port side. So therein
Speaker 3: you have the acronym psh port side out starboard home,
Speaker 3: meaning the voyage there you'd sit on the port side.
Speaker 3: On the voyage back, you'd sit on the starboard side.
Speaker 3: And supposedly, according to this tale, these tickets would be
Speaker 3: stamped with posh and it got so popular that people
Speaker 3: just started asking for the posh ticket.
Speaker 2: We want the posh ticket. Turns out this is garbage.
Speaker 3: This story is not true at all, and there's great
Speaker 3: reason there's it's so garbage and so questionable that Snopes
Speaker 3: has a fantastic article dissecting all of these these various
Speaker 3: versions of the story. And they have a couple of
Speaker 3: reasons that does not make sense. First of all, the
Speaker 3: way the sun would move in a journey like this
Speaker 3: would be different depending on the day. Right, This is
Speaker 3: a very long and arduous journey. And they you know,
Speaker 3: you couldn't really bank on where the sun would be exactly.
Speaker 2: It does make its own rules. And that's the thing.
Speaker 2: The winds.
Speaker 3: There were monsoon winds that would be in play, and
Speaker 3: they would change from season to season, so it would
Speaker 3: change seasonally, you know, like maybe not day to day,
Speaker 3: but certainly seasonally. And there's here's the other part. Here's
Speaker 3: the other rub as they say, which is another idiom
Speaker 3: we should explore.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there it is right there. They these trips were
Speaker 2: so long and difficult that they wouldn't book a round trip.
Speaker 2: They would be staying in India for a long time
Speaker 2: to make it worth their while they might stay months,
Speaker 2: some might even stay over like a year or so,
Speaker 2: they would not book that return trip until they knew,
Speaker 2: damn well they were ready to come home. It's it's
Speaker 2: so posh.
Speaker 3: And so the real origin of the word posh came
Speaker 3: around in eighteen thirty. And the thing about posh too
Speaker 3: is the reason stories like this can take hold is
Speaker 3: because it's its origins are a little bit murky. But
Speaker 3: there are some origins in the Romani language of the
Speaker 3: early seventeenth century, where it was a term that meant money.
Speaker 3: The term was posh huri, which was their version of
Speaker 3: a halfpence. So then the word posh kind of stuck
Speaker 3: around and started.
Speaker 2: To mean money. Money equals you are so money, you
Speaker 2: are so well to do, you are so posh. That
Speaker 2: makes a lot of sense to me. And now we
Speaker 2: use that term to mean anyone that is moneyed or
Speaker 2: looking fancy or looking like whatever their get up is
Speaker 2: is would have cost a good bit. You know.
Speaker 1: That's amazing. I have to admit I'm a little It
Speaker 1: was a little bit of an emotional roller coaster for me, Noel,
Speaker 1: because I got quite into the idea of posh. Spice's
Speaker 1: full name being port side out, starboard home spice.
Speaker 2: That would be good. That would be good.
Speaker 3: And a point that I love the Snop's article makes
Speaker 3: is that the Brits of this period, and honestly humans
Speaker 3: in general, big fans of scrap booking.
Speaker 2: Scrap booking is it was a super fashionable thing to
Speaker 2: do and not a single one of these posh stamped
Speaker 2: tickets exists in the world.
Speaker 1: Debunked.
Speaker 2: So yeah, totally debunked.
Speaker 6: But the Brits love to say posh. That's probably where
Speaker 6: I know the term from.
Speaker 3: Of course, you're a posh dandy, you know, like a
Speaker 3: posh dandy trip and the light fantastic there.
Speaker 4: We like that line from peep Showers, like he calls
Speaker 4: them a posh spaz. You probably iron your socks, yes, yes, exactly.
Speaker 1: Also also I propose that we take it upon ourselves
Speaker 1: to bring back posh as a slang term for money.
Speaker 1: There's always there's so many I think you can. I
Speaker 1: think you can pull it off and no one will
Speaker 1: bust you, you know what I mean. Like if you
Speaker 1: say how much Pasha is that, they'll just say it's
Speaker 1: four thirty five.
Speaker 3: I think that works totally. There's some like you ever
Speaker 3: heard of like scratch. You heard someone calling money scratch?
Speaker 1: Sure cheddar Posh.
Speaker 2: Is way cooler? Yeah, posh is way cool.
Speaker 5: You got the pasha more fashionable?
Speaker 2: Sounds like something Ali g would say that.
Speaker 1: You would say, yaksha exactly pasha. Oh boy?
Speaker 5: All right, well.
Speaker 1: Uh now we now we turn to let's see what
Speaker 1: what you got something? Frank, you got one for us?
Speaker 4: Sure? I was looking at, uh, what's cracking in? What's
Speaker 4: cracking in on tonight? Do y'all have what's cracking? Do
Speaker 4: y'all have any idea of what's going on?
Speaker 2: Like some some what's the HAPs?
Speaker 4: Yeah, what's the HAPs what's the buzz, what's the you know,
Speaker 4: what's the new gossip? Yeah? Yeah, yeah. And so I
Speaker 4: was looking into this and you know, it's not something
Speaker 4: that's native to America. It's but it's been around in
Speaker 4: England for a while and specifically it comes from the
Speaker 4: Ulster area and the Scots Irish area of the British Isles.
Speaker 4: And originally it was spelled you know like the way
Speaker 4: we spell it now, like c R A c K.
Speaker 2: That was American. Then it was an americanized version or no.
Speaker 4: Well no, no, no, it was originally started out in
Speaker 4: as Middle English, and it was just like it, you know,
Speaker 4: it was related to the sound but it but in
Speaker 4: this particular usage of it, it pertained to like a
Speaker 4: lot of chatter basically like people, you know, you go
Speaker 4: into a loud bar restaurant, you hear just you know.
Speaker 5: White noise.
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, I believe they call them pubs over there.
Speaker 4: Yeah yeah, so yes, exactly exactly. And so what I
Speaker 4: found really interesting about this was that it's an example
Speaker 4: of a reborrowing. So it was primarily used in you know, Scotland,
Speaker 4: Northern England and in Northern Ireland. It really wasn't used
Speaker 4: in Ireland, even though we associate you know, when people
Speaker 4: say where's the crack or what's the crack and not
Speaker 4: what I.
Speaker 3: Think of when people say where's the crack, I'm thinking
Speaker 3: of something completely different.
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, yeah totally. But yeah, but say if you
Speaker 4: were in Ireland and somebody asked you that, you know,
Speaker 4: they would just take you to a cool bar, you know,
Speaker 4: a restaurant or whatever, then sell you some crack, sell
Speaker 4: you some crack and then you'd continue about your night.
Speaker 4: So cracks use in mainland Ireland or the non northern
Speaker 4: Ireland part really is more of a recent thing and
Speaker 4: kind of started in the late sixties. And what happened
Speaker 4: was they took crack and Gala sized it and started
Speaker 4: to spell it c r a Ic, you know, so
Speaker 4: they don't have a k in Gaelic, and I don't
Speaker 4: know why they chose to put an eye in front
Speaker 4: of them.
Speaker 2: That's what I'm saying.
Speaker 3: It looks like a more Middle English version, like I
Speaker 3: would think of it, like, you know, the craik was
Speaker 3: the whisky and then he deeves and all that kind of.
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly, it's got a jabberwocky vibe to it as well.
Speaker 2: Really in the Sleepy Tutes.
Speaker 1: Yes, yes, the guy ron gimbal So I wonder if
Speaker 1: it's related to Archaic in any way just because of
Speaker 1: that Ai.
Speaker 4: It's just an example of the Irish taking this word
Speaker 4: and giving it a more Gaelic sort of rebranding. And
Speaker 4: that's really kind of like what it turns into, because
Speaker 4: it turns into this Gaelic spelling of it, and it
Speaker 4: becomes associated with Irish nightlife culture and just going out
Speaker 4: and having fun and raising hell and all that kind
Speaker 4: of stuff, and then it ends up coming back into English.
Speaker 4: By way of Ireland, and it kind of now means
Speaker 4: like fun, nightlife, gossip and all this kind of stuff,
Speaker 4: but with the kind of Irish flavor to it.
Speaker 1: So are we are we having cracked? Now? Is this?
Speaker 1: Is this what we're doing?
Speaker 4: I'd like to hope. So okay, all right?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 6: Is that how you would say it too? We're having crack?
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, we're having a crack.
Speaker 5: And I feel very strange, very.
Speaker 1: Fake, say like because I went to a good crack. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I went to Dublin last year. And what surprised me
Speaker 1: is I had heard people use this phrase, but I
Speaker 1: had no idea what it meant. And it was never
Speaker 1: in a situation where I wanted to stop someone and
Speaker 1: be like part of me, fellow Irish person, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean? What?
Speaker 2: What?
Speaker 1: What is this crack of what you speak?
Speaker 5: Take a crack?
Speaker 2: And where can I get some? Sorry?
Speaker 3: I keep leaning on that, but it's I can't, I
Speaker 3: can't hear that. So to me, what what what comes
Speaker 3: to mind is what's cracking?
Speaker 5: Yes?
Speaker 3: And I also another popular British expression is a cracking
Speaker 3: good time exactly, So you're saying that's cracking good you know?
Speaker 5: That is?
Speaker 2: I think it just means that it's super exciting and
Speaker 2: fun and upbeat, high energy.
Speaker 4: Yeah, totally. And one interesting thing I came across with
Speaker 4: this is that it's kind of now that it's become
Speaker 4: readopted by English speakers, it's now kind of like seen
Speaker 4: as kind of like emblematic of the disney Ification of
Speaker 4: Irish culture. You saw like the proliferation of like Irish
Speaker 4: pubs in the nineties, you know. And that gipsy mcs
Speaker 4: stumbles exactly.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I didn't make that up.
Speaker 3: And Frank and I's hometown of a US to Georgia,
Speaker 3: which she mentioned last episode, there is an Irish bar
Speaker 3: that's sort of like an Irish bar Hooters called Tipsy
Speaker 3: mc stumbles.
Speaker 4: Wow.
Speaker 3: If that's not the most offensive cultural appropriation that I
Speaker 3: can think off the top of my head, I don't
Speaker 3: know what it is.
Speaker 4: You know, there are a lot of really cool examples
Speaker 4: of reborrowing that I thought were really interesting, you know,
Speaker 4: like the you know how like animation in English and
Speaker 4: then jap in Japan there's anime and then now in
Speaker 4: English animation that has this from.
Speaker 2: Japan or japanimation.
Speaker 1: Nobody says.
Speaker 5: Nobody says, I'm not supposed to.
Speaker 2: Say that that will get you punched by fans of
Speaker 2: the medium.
Speaker 4: Yeah, so it's come full circle back to animes.
Speaker 1: So I have a question, can we as Americans use
Speaker 1: this phrase or we being jerks?
Speaker 4: I would if I was going over there, I would
Speaker 4: be like, listen, I don't want I don't want. I
Speaker 4: don't want this, Mickey Mickey Mouse, Donald duck crack. You know,
Speaker 4: I'm looking for the real thing, saying, you know, don't
Speaker 4: send me to where the tourists are.
Speaker 6: See, okay, I feel like I'm not into Donald duck
Speaker 6: crack either person of all.
Speaker 2: Oh my goodness, last thing, real quick. I keep seeing
Speaker 2: this on the internet when I'm looking at this. The
Speaker 2: crack was ninety. Why isn't it hundred?
Speaker 4: That is the highest gradation of crack.
Speaker 5: Breaking bad crack.
Speaker 4: If you go past crack ninety, then you've entered into
Speaker 4: minus crack, where you've had too good of a time
Speaker 4: and you know, you said some terrible things and gotten
Speaker 4: into a fight, and you know, the minus crack.
Speaker 2: I'll cancel you. You're canceled this season, right, you were
Speaker 2: so minus crack. That was fantastic.
Speaker 3: First of all, when you texted the group saying that
Speaker 3: I thought you were misspelling a word, and I was like,
Speaker 3: I do what this is?
Speaker 2: But I am. I am delighted this. I literally learned
Speaker 2: something new.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I didn't want to. I didn't want to mention
Speaker 1: it in our off air talk because I thought you
Speaker 1: would like have more fun.
Speaker 2: You knew what it was?
Speaker 1: Yeah, because you Yeah. I actually when we were there,
Speaker 1: we ended up entirely through accidents, staying next to the
Speaker 1: most notorious club in Dublin, which is a place called
Speaker 1: Copper Faced Jacks. I don't want to go too far
Speaker 1: into detail on it, but if you are by a
Speaker 1: computer that is not associated with your work, feel free
Speaker 1: to google it and check out what happens at Copper
Speaker 1: Face Jacks. I hear it's rage and crack. It's at ninety.
Speaker 1: Am I doing that right?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Oh crack ninety crack ninety. We should do, we should do.
Speaker 1: There's some T shirt ideas here, guys.
Speaker 4: These are T shirt I do right and let us know. Yeah,
Speaker 4: I'll wear any shirt with crack on it.
Speaker 1: That's what people say about you. I have one you, guys.
Speaker 1: It might it might surprise you. Have you ever felt
Speaker 1: that you were doing something or involved in some kind
Speaker 1: of project that felt too improvised, somewhat.
Speaker 2: Haphazard, like this podcast.
Speaker 1: No, we had a hey, we had a plan, we
Speaker 1: had a text, we had a text, a text threat.
Speaker 6: So more Lucy Goosey than this is what you're saying,
Speaker 6: and not lucy.
Speaker 1: But but that's a great one too, that's true. The
Speaker 1: phrase willy nilly, which is for older generations.
Speaker 2: I'm sorry, just willy nilly, Lucy goosey, the similar sing song.
Speaker 1: Yeah they've got some whimsy to them, right, they're a
Speaker 1: bit of June. But willy nilly, Now, it's something that
Speaker 1: you would associate with, let's be honest, maybe a child,
Speaker 1: a teacher, or an older person say in a way
Speaker 1: like if you've ever seen a very wholesome person get angry,
Speaker 1: they would use a phrase like willy nilly, you cannot
Speaker 1: be out all hours of the night driving willy nilly,
Speaker 1: hither and.
Speaker 5: Yon hither and thither.
Speaker 1: Yes, yes, pal mel So. Nowadays, in twenty nineteen, we
Speaker 1: associate this with the definition that I think we all
Speaker 1: recognized instantly doing something without a good set of directions,
Speaker 1: lackluster planning, somewhat haphazardly, which reminds us I feel terrible,
Speaker 1: super producer Casey Pegro. We went willy Nilly into the
Speaker 1: beginning of this podcast.
Speaker 3: We ran rough shot over our normal top of the show,
Speaker 3: shout out to.
Speaker 2: Casey, Yes, please do Yes, we are penitent. I blame you, Ron,
Speaker 2: what come on, we blame Rowin.
Speaker 5: Oh look, I'm sorry, Casey. Do you forgive me?
Speaker 1: I forgive you.
Speaker 5: Oh I'll listen to that. Huh Casey on the case.
Speaker 6: Yeah, and it sounded very sincere. So you guys need
Speaker 6: to take a deep breath.
Speaker 5: Right, We're good.
Speaker 1: So willy nilly is much older than might originally suspect
Speaker 1: the phrase that survives now w I l l y
Speaker 1: dash n I l l y is the winner of
Speaker 1: a long battle between various different spellings, and it's even
Speaker 1: become a great fake name if you guys are into
Speaker 1: those William nillium. Who's who's going to use that at
Speaker 1: the airport next every hotel? Every hotel. So the early
Speaker 1: meaning of the word nil is key to the understanding
Speaker 1: it used to. It used to mean originally with or
Speaker 1: against your will. So come hell or high water is
Speaker 1: closer to the original version of willy nilly Because the
Speaker 1: early meaning of the word nil it was the opposite
Speaker 1: of will, a contraction of nay will so ash so
Speaker 1: so I nil do that, I will not do that.
Speaker 6: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Websters defines it as whether you like it or not. Yep,
Speaker 2: and so I've always wanted to say. Webster's defines it
Speaker 2: as sorry.
Speaker 1: Perfect.
Speaker 6: Shout out to Websters.
Speaker 1: So will I nil I can be expanded into b
Speaker 1: I willing b I unwilling, combining the two sentiments with
Speaker 1: the implication that it doesn't matter how you feel about it,
Speaker 1: you are stuck doing this thing. I got a lot
Speaker 1: of this information from one of my favorite word websites,
Speaker 1: which is Worldwide Words. It is a treasure trove, the cavalcade,
Speaker 1: a very very strange phrases.
Speaker 3: And an interesting backstory. The guy that that maintained it right.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, he is no longer actively updating the site,
Speaker 1: But Michael Quinnion has spent his entire life studying this.
Speaker 1: He's a one man army and it's it's fascinating, just
Speaker 1: the sheer bulk of stuff he described. So shout out
Speaker 1: to you, Mike, and thanks for putting this together. So
Speaker 1: the phrase it still dates back at least a thousand years.
Speaker 1: The earliest known version was in an old English text
Speaker 1: called Lives of Saints. The line is saying satan food
Speaker 1: and skilled and bone mode, will we nil? I don't
Speaker 1: know what he's talking about, but he got there.
Speaker 2: And something about skating and bone was it? Skanks and bones?
Speaker 1: Sin sinbul and stolen bone mode? Ed mode mood.
Speaker 2: I'm in ed mode, bro, You're so ed mode right now.
Speaker 3: That's like when you like actively are sort of like
Speaker 3: a d weeb, like I'm in full ed mode. And
Speaker 3: then it this is great, Great, he's gonna be t shirts.
Speaker 1: And then it occurs in the Tami in the Shrew
Speaker 1: in fifteen ninety six, with its original meaning. Petruccio, speaking
Speaker 1: to Catherina, says, thus, in plain terms, your father hath
Speaker 1: consented that you shall be my wife. Your dowry greed
Speaker 1: on and will you nill you? I will marry you?
Speaker 1: Super creepy dude.
Speaker 2: Wow, Yeah, that's that's not a good look for Patriuccio.
Speaker 2: What's his name?
Speaker 1: That's right?
Speaker 2: Oh, I got it.
Speaker 1: He nailed it, man. And this is just a I
Speaker 1: think a great example of how previously maybe not sinister,
Speaker 1: but previously more combative or less innocuous terms become these
Speaker 1: fun things that we throw around now, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean, You're not You're like the odds of you
Speaker 1: being in an altercation and someone saying will you or
Speaker 1: nil you in a threatening manner that's just safely not
Speaker 1: gonna happen.
Speaker 3: Yeah, no, I totally agree. I do have to say, Ben,
Speaker 3: I use this one quite a lot.
Speaker 1: Ah yeah, U.
Speaker 2: I use it Willy Nilly just every which way. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I really do. I really really like Willy Nilly.
Speaker 1: Oh come on, I keep thinking of what's that song
Speaker 1: wily Bully? Will? I keep thinking of this song Willy Bully,
Speaker 1: but just with the lyrics replaced Willy Nilly.
Speaker 2: I like it, which actually works.
Speaker 3: I do, But honestly that when I use it, though,
Speaker 3: I use it in kind of a Larry David kind
Speaker 3: of like grumpy old man way, where.
Speaker 2: I'm like, you can't just go doing this stuff Willy Nilly,
Speaker 2: you know, like you know, it's this idea of, uh,
Speaker 2: there's gotta be a little order involved. You can't just.
Speaker 6: Go you can't just be going out, you know, doing
Speaker 6: whatever it is you're doing, whatever the case might be, whose.
Speaker 4: Can be haphazard or pill mel pell mell.
Speaker 3: Which is so funny because there's cigarettes I was about
Speaker 3: to say our grandpa cigarettes. I would also say willy
Speaker 3: nilly probably, but Grandpa's pronounced pall Mel and if you
Speaker 3: look at the pack, it's clearly Paul Mal and they're
Speaker 3: still around, but apparently they're like that. That's one of
Speaker 3: these examples of willful disagreement of an obvious pronunciation.
Speaker 2: You know, like, yeah, I love that.
Speaker 4: Maybe we're just like I'm gonna smoke this as fast
Speaker 4: as toss the ball and.
Speaker 5: Time to the box.
Speaker 1: A person with things to do. So that's that's the story.
Speaker 1: So we have posh, we have crack. We took a
Speaker 1: crack at crack, yeah, and then we have willy Nilly.
Speaker 1: But we weren't quite willing n only with this episode
Speaker 1: because we did have a plan. We did promise everyone
Speaker 1: in the beginning that we would we would each present
Speaker 1: an idiom and Rowans since you are an alumni of
Speaker 1: the show, now alumnus.
Speaker 7: Alumna, alumn aluminium, since you are in fact built largely
Speaker 7: from aluminium, No, we would like to give the honor
Speaker 7: to you.
Speaker 1: You have the last idiom. Now this means that if
Speaker 1: the three of us have really dropped the ball here
Speaker 1: and don't know where that one comes from. Then it's
Speaker 1: no pressure on you to save the show.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I don't. I don't feel pressure by that statement
Speaker 5: at all.
Speaker 1: Good because Nolan Frank gave you some serious nods and
Speaker 1: once you know that we're not joking.
Speaker 6: Okay, they all just crack their knuckles and they're looking
Speaker 6: at me very sternly.
Speaker 5: I want to know, can you hear those knuckles?
Speaker 2: That is not fully that is that is in the room?
Speaker 5: Wow?
Speaker 6: Okay, Well, I'm triggered by the wedding bullets right now.
Speaker 6: Put that on your list, by the way there, because
Speaker 6: I'm tripping balls.
Speaker 5: Tripping the balls. Fantastic? Got it?
Speaker 6: Uh? Yeah, there's actually a dry race board behind Ben
Speaker 6: or he puts a tally of every accidental idiom we utter.
Speaker 2: Ben literally keeps score in all things, in all things
Speaker 2: podcast related.
Speaker 1: I'm super petty, get it?
Speaker 5: But sure, Yeah, here we go, let's jump in. Uh.
Speaker 6: This is a lesser known idiom for the people out there.
Speaker 5: Hard boxing the runway.
Speaker 6: If you're not familiar with this, it refers to someone
Speaker 6: who's maybe showboating or peacocking a bit, you know, maybe
Speaker 6: accidentally alienating a crowd as opposed to enlightening with their
Speaker 6: flair and mild superiority, but like big personality.
Speaker 1: I've heard this, but I have no idea where it
Speaker 1: comes from. Is it like a is like a European
Speaker 1: thing or is it.
Speaker 6: You know, I think it's origins or English? But uh
Speaker 6: but I think English, So yeah, European?
Speaker 5: Okay, English? Did you do the home?
Speaker 1: Come on, we're really picking well it is one of.
Speaker 5: Those expressions that feels fake, but I promise it's.
Speaker 1: Not so okay, so so lay it honest man. What's
Speaker 1: what's the etymology? Is there a story behind this?
Speaker 6: Well, there's a man by the name of Alexander Benson okay,
Speaker 6: who was the great grandfather somebody who I know, and
Speaker 6: Admiral Nicholas van Benson who has shared this wisdom with me.
Speaker 6: Evently stems from old bricotine ships, and there was something
Speaker 6: called a like you know with at the front of
Speaker 6: the ship is the bow, in the back is the
Speaker 6: is the port? Correct start, thank you? And so in
Speaker 6: the back of the ships where you steer the ship.
Speaker 6: And if somebody was steering the ship, they they would
Speaker 6: have this semblance of you know, kind of arrogance. They'd
Speaker 6: be taking up a lot of you know, they oh,
Speaker 6: I'm in control of this ship. So they were often
Speaker 6: known as the Harbucks. They were Harbucks sing the runway,
Speaker 6: being like there the passageway from the port or the starboard.
Speaker 6: Oh okay, all right, the stern is in the backup
Speaker 6: saying but when you look forward, ah, yes, because they
Speaker 6: get this whole like vista of the entire ship and
Speaker 6: the sea because they're steering the ship.
Speaker 2: So they're sort of like hogging the spotlight.
Speaker 6: Exactly, and they can be a little braggadocious, but they're
Speaker 6: doing the job. You know. I think it's kind of
Speaker 6: an unintentional.
Speaker 4: Type of har like flexing on the gram or something.
Speaker 6: Sure, yeah, more archaic version. Yeah this, why not very
Speaker 6: because I haven't.
Speaker 1: I gotta be honest, like, I haven't. I'm familiar with it.
Speaker 1: I'm sure a lot of us listening you are, but
Speaker 1: I haven't heard it in the modern day, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean?
Speaker 6: Yeah, Well, you know, much like willy nilly, people aren't
Speaker 6: or will to the nil or whatever it was, Folks
Speaker 6: aren't using this as as often as they should.
Speaker 1: You.
Speaker 6: Frankly, I'm a little upset that people are often try
Speaker 6: to call me on this, but it is real, as
Speaker 6: the table we're in front of.
Speaker 1: Right, we are not sitting down, We're standing.
Speaker 6: Real as the table in front of us. So you
Speaker 6: can put that on the tally board. All right, So
Speaker 6: do you think people should bring this back? I strongly
Speaker 6: suggest it would be for the benefit of all if
Speaker 6: we because because you got to call people on their
Speaker 6: on their bs often.
Speaker 5: You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: I'm saying, okay, so I'm in it.
Speaker 3: Okay, yeah, all right, what I don't know, man.
Speaker 5: I wrote a bunch of other fake things. Do you
Speaker 5: want me to read?
Speaker 6: Yes?
Speaker 5: Yes, I mean real things.
Speaker 1: Oh okay, yeah.
Speaker 6: Because I did actually google the word harbuck, because you
Speaker 6: know that's what the internet's for, right, sure, okay. Harbuck
Speaker 6: could have ties to a Gaelic expression Harbuck, which was
Speaker 6: a surname or habitational name taken from our Buckle, a
Speaker 6: parish of air Dry, Lancashire. I think I'm pronouncing I
Speaker 6: think correctly.
Speaker 5: But it's late Galic.
Speaker 1: Yes, fine, well really so Gelic.
Speaker 5: It's as Gaelic.
Speaker 1: So we we've got crack and we came back around exactly.
Speaker 6: We're back And he was talking about ships at the
Speaker 6: beginning of the show. Wow, yeah, think about that.
Speaker 2: It's almost as though.
Speaker 5: I'm definitely usual suspects, Almost.
Speaker 2: As though you invented or I'm sorry, discovered the perfect
Speaker 2: crystallization of everything that we did in this episode, summed
Speaker 2: up in a completely believable and meticulously researched idiom.
Speaker 6: I you know, I couldn't have said a better myself
Speaker 6: by I'm patting myself on the back. However, Nicholas von Benson, Admiral,
Speaker 6: deserves a large amount of the credit as well.
Speaker 2: I must say, was he the hard Was he the
Speaker 2: original Harbucks?
Speaker 4: Here?
Speaker 5: Was the original person to Hardbucks the runway?
Speaker 2: I actually say this wouldn't an admiral. He would just
Speaker 2: be commanding. He wouldn't be steering.
Speaker 5: He was kind of a dick about it.
Speaker 1: Okay, some people are really hands on, you know people, Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 5: Because you know it's you know, there are shifts. It's
Speaker 5: also a power move, exactly.
Speaker 1: Like you would admirally want people to know you still
Speaker 1: got it.
Speaker 6: He would often just like shout hey, guys, look at me, Hey,
Speaker 6: check out the the steering on this guy.
Speaker 5: Huh handling?
Speaker 6: Yeah, And then people would be swabbing the poop deck
Speaker 6: like that's nice, sir, that's great.
Speaker 1: Well, you know what I say, we take this to
Speaker 1: our favorite court because if anyone can get to the
Speaker 1: bottom of the veracity of this figure speech, it will
Speaker 1: be our super producer, Casey Pegram Casey, question for you,
Speaker 1: when was the last time you heard hard boxing the runway?
Speaker 8: I would estimate about an hour ago. Well, we're talking
Speaker 8: about it outside before recording. This is new to you,
Speaker 8: it's a new one to me. But you know, it
Speaker 8: feels like it should be real, So it has that
Speaker 8: going for it.
Speaker 5: Should be real.
Speaker 6: Casey, I thought we were.
Speaker 8: I mean, you know, all languages constructed, so I mean, really,
Speaker 8: what is real? Yeah versus fake?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 5: Thank you.
Speaker 6: And that's actually something I texted nol Earler.
Speaker 2: That's very true. You did, so be it true? Will he?
Speaker 2: Nill he? You know, I think it demonstrates the malleability
Speaker 2: of language and the power of belief, because what we're
Speaker 2: all about here on.
Speaker 1: Ridiculous system and it's like our main thing.
Speaker 5: It's it's one.
Speaker 1: Of our main things. So guys, again, thank you so
Speaker 1: much for dropping by and helping ship some light on
Speaker 1: the mysteries of etymology for those of us listening, And
Speaker 1: we want to thank you for all the responses we
Speaker 1: receive to our previous idiomatic for the people. Right in,
Speaker 1: let us know some of your favorite figures of speech,
Speaker 1: terms of phrase, idioms. Also, if you speak languages other
Speaker 1: than English, what's something that you think sounds really strange
Speaker 1: in English but is very common in some other language.
Speaker 1: That's an episode. All it's over.
Speaker 4: There are some great Lindas.
Speaker 3: Thanks to you, my dear friend, my dear old friend,
Speaker 3: Frank Malhair and coiner of the idiomatic for the people,
Speaker 3: ephemeral friend of the show, and now what's the what's
Speaker 3: the opposite of ephemeral?
Speaker 2: Concrete, flat lasting, corporeal friend of the show, part of
Speaker 2: the show. It's been a long time comment.
Speaker 3: Thanks for being here, man, thanks for having I know
Speaker 3: you had to rush over here from work and it
Speaker 3: means the world.
Speaker 2: Rowan Nuby, Yeah, thanks so much.
Speaker 1: Rowan. You can find you can find mister Nuby on
Speaker 1: his own show Pitches, which is a comedy podcast about
Speaker 1: the evaluation of ideas. Correct a monopoly of ideas, right,
Speaker 1: that is correct?
Speaker 6: Very good word. Yeah, you know it's like Shark Tank
Speaker 6: mindus all the stress and money and plus all the
Speaker 6: chatter and fun and irreverence and.
Speaker 5: So yeah, it's pretty off the cuff.
Speaker 6: I got Ben Bowlin here actually coming up on an episode,
Speaker 6: and I got Noel Brown here on one that's airing today.
Speaker 2: How do you like them?
Speaker 5: Apples?
Speaker 1: So you can check it out now wherever you find
Speaker 1: your favorite podcast.
Speaker 6: That's correct, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, all the things to get
Speaker 6: on their baby at Pitches Podcasts Get it.
Speaker 1: You can also find us on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter.
Speaker 1: Meet one of our favorite parts of the show, your
Speaker 1: fellow listeners on our Facebook page Ridiculous Historians.
Speaker 3: Big thanks to super producer Casey Pegram, Big thanks to
Speaker 3: our research associate Gabe luz Here, and thanks to Alex Williams.
Speaker 2: Who composed are ever so earwormy theme.
Speaker 1: And as you said in previous pisode, write it and
Speaker 1: let us know if there were any figures of speech
Speaker 1: or terms of phrase that we used unconsciously. I'm sure
Speaker 1: they were in there. You can find my personal Instagram
Speaker 1: at ben Bolin and hey, Nola, you're on the internet too.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm on the insternet at Embryonic Insider double ats.
Speaker 2: That's the only way you can find it. I'm kidding.
Speaker 2: Just a single app.
Speaker 1: Willy nilly, great crack, folks, stay tuned for our next
Speaker 1: episode when we do something that we guarantee will be ridiculous.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's the least we can guarantee. We'll see you
Speaker 2: next time.
Speaker 3: For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
Speaker 3: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.