Hola

[Rex W. Stocklin]

At 7:21 AM -0800 3/28/05, Jonathan Lighter wrote:

>Okay, I'll bite. Is "shits 'n' grins" legit, or just something
>creative to impress us ?

Um, far be it from me to even dare to impress this fast lexical
crowd. My coinages are generally really awful puns and as I've been
currently reading the at once entertaining and mildly pedantic
"Predicting New Words" by Allan Metcalf (Houghton Mifflin), I'm told
that MY style of neologizing is destined for utter failure. Sigh....

But, more to the point.... "shits & grins" has been in use, at least
in rural Indiana for as long as I could count. My grandfolks used it
(well, the cool grandfolks, the ones not stuck on Puritanical mouth
worship) and I've heard enough other non-kin use it to know it wasn't
just a family custom. It is somewhat derivative or precedential to
"shits & giggles", I know not which. Google the expression & you'll
find a few hundred citations.

In fact, this from a BBS call Wordorigins Org (no dot):  "I'm more
familiar with the phrase "shits and grins" and have been using it for
decades. My son taught me "shits and giggles" when he was in college
a bit over ten years ago."
<http://p098.ezboard.com/fwordoriginsorgfrm1.showMessage?topicID=11580.topic>

I'm a shittin' & I'm a grinnin' (apologies to Roy Clark & Buck Owens)
Lexy Rexy
Fishers, IN