"strong as ball"

[Jonathan Lighter]

I was once upbraided by another grad student for using "guts" conversationally.  "Don't say 'guts,'" she complained, "when you mean 'balls.'"  She wasn't kidding, either.

Go figure.  This was in 1975.

JL

sagehen <sagehen at WESTELCOM.COM> wrote:
---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: sagehen
Subject: Re: "guy"
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There's an interesting contrast between the expression "regular guy" as
used in the US & the UK. (This UK usage is probably out of date by several
decades!)
Whereas here it connotes "true blue," "stand up," "good fellow," &c., in UK
it means -- or meant -- a figure of fun, or a foolish-looking, or
outlandishly dressed
person. These meanings deriving, presumably from the Guy Fawkes effigies
carried about and burnt on bonfires on GF day (Nov 5).

On the "strong as ball" thread, I've lost the original post & don't
remember whence the citation came, but ISTM that mistaking "intestinal" for
"testicular" could well arise from mis-hearing or misapprehending this
euphemism for "guts," (perhaps from childhood) in a society that is a lot
more attentive to testicles than intestines.

A. Murie


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