ginger = "extremely careful"

[Wilson Gray]

Jon, are you implying that, e.g. "daily," as in "The _Daily_ Show" is
*not* an adverb? ;-)

>From the Judge Mathis Show:

"First, I waited a week, then I waited a whole 'nother week [before
tossing out my former tenant's property]."

The judge himself states that "I got the whole alphabet after me" is
BE slang for "I'm in big trouble," i.e. "The ATF, the IRS, the FBI,
the PD, etc. are all after me."

-Wilson

On 12/11/06, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at YAHOO.COM>
> Subject:      ginger = "extremely careful"
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> As engineers laid explosives to implode a factory chimney, Fox anchor John Scott, a Coloradan, comments that "there's some very ginger work going on there."
>
>   OED calls this sense of "ginger" (1600, 1675, 1882) "Obs. exc. dial." This is the first time I can recall hearing a living person say it, but if you think "gingerly" _must_ be an adverb because it ends in  "-ly," it makes perfect sense.
>
>   Not that many Americans say "gingerly."
>
>   JL
>
>
>
>
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--
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange complaint to
come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-----
-Sam Clemens

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