Follow-up on sluff - play hooky, slack off

Benjamin Barrett gogaku at IX.NETCOM.COM
Tue Aug 9 19:16:02 UTC 2011


On Aug 9, 2011, at 11:52 AM, Joel S. Berson wrote:

> At 8/9/2011 12:56 PM, Benjamin Barrett wrote:
>> Not being familiar with the meaning of "slough off its skin" for
>> snakes, I don't have that connection. I can understand the
>> etymological connection but have trouble seeing "sloughing off its
>> skin" being a basis for something like "quit sluffing (off) and get
>> back to work."
>
> I didn't mean to slight "sluffing" of homework -- I agree that an
> additional sense may be warranted.  I just wanted to assert that
> "sluff off" transitive did not seem odd to me.
>
> Ben, were you raised in Ireland?  :-)

Since I have no idea why you would ask that, I must not have been (aside from that fact that I know that I wasn't).

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