Heard on The Judges: "bum-rush"

[Wilson Gray]

Pretty girls? Now, that's something that I _should_ have remembered!
;-) In fact, I do recall when the guy who ran my neighborhood bar in
L.A. hired a bikini-babe, back in the '60's. Then, there was the bar
_not_ in my neighborhood - I had to take the freeway down to get there
- that had a female bartender - called a "barmaid," in those barbaric
times - and a wait-staff, consisting of a single woman, who both wore
only g-strings. Well worth the trip! Well, it was, in those
more-puritanical days, at least.

More-or-less back on topic, I've noticed that, here of late, people
are using _g-string_ to mean "thong." They're *not* the same thing!
Well, there's no point in getting upset. Think of how poor Beowulf
would feel, were he to be confronted with today's English!

-Wilson

On Wed, Aug 13, 2008 at 7:20 AM, Marc Velasco <marcjvelasco at gmail.com> wrote:
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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Marc Velasco <marcjvelasco at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: Heard on The Judges: "bum-rush"
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Now that you mention it, I'm not sure how many times I've heard it 'in real
> life.'  I'm fairly confident it's been more than a few, but given the number
> of violent attacks I've seen IRL versus the violence to be found in
> books/movies, I'm guessing my experience has also been more rooted in the
> latter.
>
> That and I've seldom seen bartenders actually escort unruly patrons out of
> bars; maybe it's the times, maybe it's the location, but most establishments
> have positioned pretty girls behind the bar, more for attracting customers,
> than for keeping order.
>
>
>
> On Wed, Aug 13, 2008 at 1:36 AM, Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
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>> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> Poster:       Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
>> Subject:      Re: Heard on The Judges: "bum-rush"
>>
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> As somebody - a cartoon character? - used to say: "It's possa-bull."
>> Seriously speaking, I have no doubt that what you say is true, given
>> that you write from your personal experience, as I was writing from
>> mine: this was the first time that I'd ever heard the term used in
>> real life in any meaning whatsoever. In books and movies of my
>> experience from fifty years ago, barkeepers "gave the bum's rush to"
>> or "bum-rushed" unruly patrons by shoving or otherwise physically
>> forcing them out of the bar and onto the sidewalk.
>>
>> You can see why hearing "bum-rush" used of _dogs_ in the public way
>> attacking other _dogs_ in the public way would have engaged my
>> attention.
>>
>> -Wilson
>>
>> On Tue, Aug 12, 2008 at 4:04 PM, Marc Velasco <marcjvelasco at gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>> > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>> -----------------------
>> > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> > Poster:       Marc Velasco <marcjvelasco at GMAIL.COM>
>> > Subject:      Re: Heard on The Judges: "bum-rush"
>> >
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> >
>> > IME, bum-rush is being used as I've always heard it, as some sort of
>> quick,
>> > not-usually-too-fair assault.  sometimes by ambush, or blindside.  at
>> least
>> > that's the connotations usually surrounding it IME.
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> > On Tue, Aug 12, 2008 at 3:45 PM, Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com> wrote:
>> >
>> >> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>> >> -----------------------
>> >> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> >> Poster:       Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
>> >> Subject:      Heard on The Judges: "bum-rush"
>> >>
>> >>
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> >>
>> >> Spoken by presumably European-American, standard-speaking, voice-over
>> guy:
>> >>
>> >> "The plaintiff complains that the defendants' nine dogs _bum-rushed_
>> >> his two dogs."
>> >>
>> >>
>> >> I.e., one group of dogs _attacked_ another group.
>> >>
>> >> However, IMO, to _bum-rush_ is to _frog-walk or otherwise throw an
>> >> undesirable patron out of a joint_ and not to attack him, whether as
>> >> an individual or in a group. Of course, since "bum-rush" and
>> >> "frog-walk" are both only literary terms for me, I could very well be
>> >> completely mistaken, here.
>> >>
>> >> FWIW, I've never even heard of such a thing as requiring, or even
>> >> merely asking, a patron to leave a bar, in real life. In Jim-Crow
>> >> days, naturally, I sometimes experienced being refused entrance to a
>> >> watering-place, from the be-ginning. A Japanese-American friend told
>> >> me of being refused entrance to bars in Oklahoma, when he was a
>> >> cannon-cocker at Fort Sill, on the grounds that he was a Native
>> >> American. Since he was always subsequently admitted, after
>> >> demonstrating that he was neither an Indian nor black, he - and I -
>> >> thought that some white Oklahomans really did think that he was an
>> >> Indian. (For me, that story nailed the ceiling to the roof, WRT the
>> >> theory that the progenitors of Native Americans emigrated from Asia.)
>> >>
>> >> -Wilson
>> >> --
>> >> All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange complaint to
>> >> come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
>> >> -----
>> >>  -Sam'l Clemens
>> >>
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>>
>>
>> --
>> All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange complaint to
>> come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
>> -----
>> -Mark Twain
>>
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>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>
>
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--
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange complaint to
come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-----
-Mark Twain

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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org