strum up support

[Doug Harris]

In a poetic way, _strum up support_ makes perfect sense if referring to
the effort stringed-instrument-bearing buskers, flower children and
the like do to allow them to continue the lifestyle they've chosen.
Oh, and FWIW, there still (or again) _are_ flower children about. I
saved one this morning from continuing down the interstate highway
ramp she was descending, bound to become an illegal pedestrian. 'Had
a nice conversation with her over the course of a 60-mile ride that,
had I given much thought to the possible (negative) consequences of an
intended good deed, never would have occurred. I guess I reckoned there
is little likelihood of a truly ill-intended soul having a small stuffed
animal attached to her hat. (!)
(the other) doug



FWIW, this is the first time that I've ever come across "strum up" for
"drum up." With any luck, I'll never run across it, again. "Ha! I
should live so long," to coin a phrase.

-Wilson


> i caught this one in the 5/27/07 NYT Magazine, p. 32, in Jon
> Mooallem's "The Unintended Consequences of Rehydration":
>
> The morning I visited, he had unearthed 300 copies of letters
> Chambers sent, often while overseas for business, to strum up support
> for the bottle bill.
> www.nytimes.com/2007/05/27/magazine/27Bottle-t.html?
> pagewanted=3&incamp=article_popular
>
> the idiom i know is "drum up", not "strum up", and OED, NOAD2, and
> AHD4 agree with me (entries for "drum up", no corresponding sense for
> "strum").
>
> 48 google webhits ("similar" entries removed) for "strum up
> support".  many have some association with music-making (the Mummers,
> for example), but some do not, e.g.:
>
> LaMont says it wasn't easy to strum up support, as people often do
> not consider film an art form and, therefore, do not think of
> donating to this industry. ...
> www.contact-mag.com/issue3/theater.htm
>
> There's no better way to strum up support in New England than take a
> shot at the Yankees-a marketing method that has proven golden for
> short-season Lowell ...
> www.baseballamerica.com/blog/business/
>
> ... they actually apply to women, rather, they use it as a political
> chess piece to strum up support for their causes and abandon us when
> the need arises. ...
> bitingbeaver.blogspot.com/2005/11/scalito-and-future-of-roe.html
>
> They strum up support for their projects by concocting some
> unrelated, bizarre relationship between a group's opposition and some
> other irrelevant issue. ...
> thepeach.blogspot.com/2005_02_27_archive.html
>
> It is only Beth Twitty saying that to strum up support. I have not
> seen any official document saying this. More of the same. Beth wants
> the world to believe ...
> www.scaredmonkeys.com/2005/09/ 25/joran-van-der-sloot-denies-
> responsibility/
>
> -----
>
> something eggcornesque.
>
> arnold


--
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'l Clemens

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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org