Idiom question

[Aaron E. Drews]

On Fri, 21 Jan 2000 Mark_Mandel at DRAGONSYS.COM wrote:

}Jim Smith wrote:
}
}>>>
}I've been told, by someone who used it in the wrong
}place (England) and was strongly reprimanded, that
}"holy cow" is an insulting (no kidding!) reference to
}the Queen of England.
}<<<
}
}Hmph. Not bloody likely... as coming from the people who think "bloody" is a
}blasphemy!  ;-)\

That's starting to lose it's "weight" of vulgarity.  It's still stronger
than "damn", but weaker than the universal expletive.


}
}But Seriously Folks, that one does sound very strange. Has anyone else heard of
}it?

I can't say that I've ever heard that particular insult applied to Her
Majesty.  I'll ask around, since the Scots tend to be more (proudly)
anti-monarchy than the English.

--Aaron



________________________________________________________________________
Aaron E. Drews                               The University of Edinburgh
aaron at ling.ed.ac.uk                  Departments of English Language and
http://www.ling.ed.ac.uk/~aaron       Theoretical & Applied  Linguistics

"MERE ACCUMULATION OF OBSERVATIONAL EVIDENCE IS NOT PROOF"
        --Death