Travelin' Shotgun

[Jonathan Lighter]

Whoever's behind that website has too much time on his hands - far too much.

  However, it does exhaustively describe what "riding (and therefore "calling") shotgun" has been all about for thirty years and more.

  "Calling shotgun" (demanding to go first) is a new development.

  Shotgunguide doesn't seem to be familiar with "travel shotgun."

  JL

"Geoffrey S. Nathan" <an6993 at WAYNE.EDU> wrote:
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Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: "Geoffrey S. Nathan"
Subject: Re: Travelin' Shotgun
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Jonathan wrote



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  Subject:


"Travelin' shotgun"



  From:

Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at YAHOO.COM>



  Date:

Wed, 29 Nov 2006 05:57:01 -0800






Today's _N.Y. Post_ features a front-page photo of Lindsay Lohan, Britney Spiers, and Paris Hilton smiling together in the back seat of a limousine. Those given to suspicion that the picture does not really illustrate the day's most significant news story should think again: the headline clearly states "BIMBO SUMMIT !"  And if that's not big news, I don't know what is.

  All this by way of context. Commenting on the photo, Fox's Steve Doocy exclaimed in his folksy way, "And they're travelin'  shotgun !"

  What's that mean ?  "Riding together,"  evidently. (I understand "riding shotgun"- sitting in the front passenger sea t- but it's nothing to get excited about.)

  A rapid Google search reveals [www.mkivsupra.net/vbb/archive/index.php/t-51280.html]:

            I was coming but Laz (won't lend me) the Supe (heehee) I was going to travel shotgun with Soo but think she may have other plans."

  JL



---------------------------------



I'm taking an undergraduate acting class this semester, and hanging out
with freshmen and sophomores three hours a week.  But they're theater
majors, so they're not prototypical.  Still, as we jockeyed to decide
who would perform his or her term-project 'scene' one of the kids said
'I call shotgun'.  The instructor (a PhD-student GA in his early
thirties) didn't know what that meant, nor did I.  Turns out it means
'I get to go first'.  At least I thought it did.  So I did some
research (nice how we can call typing something into a search engine
counts as research) and found that 'Calling shotgun' is an institution
with its own website:  http://www.shotgunguide.com/

Who knew?



Geoff




--
Geoffrey S. Nathan <geoffnathan at wayne.edu>

Faculty Liaison, Computing and Information Technology,<p>
and Associate Professor of English, Linguistics Program<p>
Phone Numbers (313) 577-1259 or (313) 577-8621<p>
Wayne State University<p>
Detroit, MI, 48202




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