"Laying giggy"

[Jesse Sheidlower]

On Thu, Feb 21, 2002 at 07:34:49PM -0500, George Thompson wrote:
> A letter appeared in this morning's (Thursday's) Daily News asking
> for "where and how certain expressions started" that the writer, "an
> old geezer" from the Red Hook area of Brooklyn, remembers.
>
> "When were were kids in the early 30's -- and sneakily shooting dice in
> the street -- we would have a lookout stationed at a strategic spot.
> This lookout would be classified as "laying giggy.""
>
> This isn't in HDAS or DARE.  I do see in HDAS that one of the meanings
> of the word "gig" is "eye", with one citation from 1925.  Was perhaps
> the kid who was "Laying giggy" thought of as a "eye" for the other kids?

Perhaps the geezer is misremembering, or remembering a variant form,
of "lay chickie," which is attested in HDAS--from the early 1930s,
coincidentally.

Jesse Sheidlower