Military jargon

[Jonathan Lighter]

Seems to me that the usual actions designated by "selling" and "buying" are here reversed.

JL

"Douglas G. Wilson" <douglas at NB.NET> wrote:
---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: "Douglas G. Wilson"
Subject: Re: Military jargon
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>Q. I'm selling [willing to pay you to work] my burn-bag detail. Want it?
>A. Yeah. I'll buy it from you for [do it for you if you pay me] ten
>dollars.
>
>I assume that paying someone else to do your work was an Army-wide
>custom. But was this particular style of language in common use?

I don't know, but I've used this exact "sell [a burdensome duty, for a
negative 'price']" myself freely in recent years. Generally it has been
understood, but once it wasn't, and when I thought about it I wasn't able
to remember where I first encountered it or indeed whether I might have
generated it independently (although I've surely heard it from others too).
Anyway, it seems natural enough ... at least until I look at it too
closely. I'm pretty sure that I did not encounter it first in a military
context.

-- Doug Wilson


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