"Keep your eye peeled" slight antedating (1848) "keep your eyes skinned" (1831)

[Jonathan Lighter]

I still say it.

JL

On Fri, Dec 4, 2009 at 5:27 PM, Mark Mandel <Mark.A.Mandel at gmail.com> wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Mark Mandel <Mark.A.Mandel at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: "Keep your eye peeled" slight antedating (1848) "keep
> your
>              eyes skinned" (1831)
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> And as for currency, in the '50s and '60s my dad used to tell us to "keep
> our eyes peeled".
>
> m a m
>
> On Fri, Dec 4, 2009 at 5:56 AM, Garson O'Toole <adsgarsonotoole at gmail.com
> >wrote:
>
> > While driving with family members during the Thanksgiving holiday I
> > was told to keep my eyes peeled for a particular road sign. Back in
> > 2000 in the ADS list archives Larry Horn wondered about the phrase:
> > "Can that be right?  Do people really keep their eyes peeled? pealed?
> > And why?  I can't find either sense in my AHD!"
> >
> > Michael Quinion at World Wide Words discusses the phrase and says,
> > "The figurative sense of keeping alert, by removing any covering of
> > the eye that might impede vision, seems to have appeared in the US
> > about 1850."
> >
> > http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-kee1.htm
> >
> > ...
>
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