Lousy-ana; Stepwell

[Wilson Gray]

It seems to me that I've known the term, "stepwell," and its
application from birth.

FWIW, The white - no colored DJ's in those days, regardless of the
type of music featured - DJ, "Groovy," of the R&B radio show,
"Groovy's Boogie," on Shreveport's KWKH, always jokingly referred to
Louisiana as "Lousy Banana," back in the 'Forties.

-Wilson Gray


On 9/13/05, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at YAHOO.COM>
> Subject:      Re: Lousy-ana; Stepwell
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> 1942 Berry & Van den Bark _American Thesaurus of Slang_ (N.Y.: Crowell) 50  LOUISIANA. ...Lousy-Anna.
>
> I was familiar with this pun when I was kid in the mid to late '50s.  It didn't make it into HDAS because these were the only occurrences I knew of.
>
> Shoulda asked more people.
>
>
> JL
>
> Bapopik at AOL.COM wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender: American Dialect Society
> Poster: Bapopik at AOL.COM
> Subject: Lousy-ana; Stepwell
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> STEPWELL
> ...
> STEPWELL + BUS--849 Google hits, 39 Google Groups hits
> ...
> I took a bus today and noticed the word "stepwell" for where I was standing.
> "Stairwell" is well-attested (bad pun) in the OED. "Stepwell" is not in the
> OED?
> ...
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> --------------------------------------------------------
> LOUSY-ANA
> ...
> LOUSYANA--3,890 Google hits, 210 Google Groups hits
> LOUSY-ANA--3,220 Google hits, 59 Google Groups hits
> ...
> ...
> This Louisiana nickname is much older than this past month. HDAS????
> ...
> ...
> (GOOGLE NEWS)
> ...
> _Vietnamese evacuees shun shelters_
> (http://www.thsv.org/news_details.aspx?newsID=721)
> Union of Vietnamese Student Associations of Southern California, CA -
> Sep 1
> ... month ago. "It used to be Louisiana, but now we call it Lousy-ana," said
> Thanh, who is staying at the Buddhist temple. Some Vietnamese ...
>
>
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--
-Wilson Gray