boiling kettles

[Jonathan Lighter]

We said, "Go soak your head ! "

JL

neil <neil at TYPOG.CO.UK> wrote:
---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: neil
Subject: Re: boiling kettles
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

on 27/7/05 5:20 am, Arnold M. Zwicky at zwicky at CSLI.STANFORD.EDU wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender: American Dialect Society
> Poster: "Arnold M. Zwicky"
>
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
--> -
>
> on a plane on my mini-vacation, i came across the following in Ian
> Rankin's _A Question of Blood_ (Little, Brown paper, 2003), p. 250:
>
> -----
> She made herself coffee, taking a mouthful before realizing she
> hadn't boiled the kettle.
> -----
>
> this was (i think) a new usage for me, and probably british. OED
> Online has:
>
> -----
> 4. a. trans. To cause (a liquid) to bubble with heat (see sense 1);
> to bring to the boiling point: esp. said of food, wholly or partly
> liquid, in the process of cooking; also of the containing vessel.
>
> c1420 Liber Cocorum 11 Boyle hit and sture lest hit brenne. a1500
> E.E. Misc. (1855) 34 Sume byllyd mettayl. 1692 Lond. Gaz. No. 2800/4
> The Copper boyls betwixt 15 and 16 Hogsheads at a time. 1831 CARLYLE
> Sart. Res. II. ix, As kind housewives..were boiling their husbands'
> kettles.
> -----
>
> the last of these is the usage i came across. but ca. 175 years
> ago. i'd guess from rankin's usage that it's still current, at least
> in scotland (where rankin sets his books). but what do i know?
>
> arnold

Certainly current throughout the UK, and recalled since a juvenile in the
1950s.
FWIW there's a slang expression "Go boil your head" used when in
disagreement with someone.

--Neil Crawford


---------------------------------
Yahoo! Mail for Mobile
 Take Yahoo! Mail with you! Check email on your mobile phone.