'grab the wrong end of the stick"

[Jonathan Lighter]

There's also the "short end of the stick," the "dirty end," and the
"shitten/ shitty end."  The last goes back at least to the 1840s.

JL

On Fri, Jul 10, 2009 at 5:01 PM, Benjamin Zimmer <
bgzimmer at babel.ling.upenn.edu> wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Benjamin Zimmer <bgzimmer at BABEL.LING.UPENN.EDU>
> Subject:      Re: 'grab the wrong end of the stick"
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> On Fri, Jul 10, 2009 at 4:34 PM, Joel S. Berson wrote:
> >
> > At 7/10/2009 04:16 PM, ronbutters at AOL.COM wrote:
> >>Check the AMERICAN SPEECH. This was discussed there 30 years ago.
> >
> > I was too young to be permitted such thoughts 30 years ago.
> >
> > Can someone help me pin down the issue?  I'd like to pass the
> > information along to my correspondent.
>
> How about 23 years ago? I believe the relevant articles are:
>
> James B. McMillan, 1986. "Short End of the Stick." AmSp 61:306.
> Ron Butters, 1991. "More on Short End of the Stick." AmSp 66:36.
> Charles Doyle, 1994. "The Long Story of The Short End of the Stick" AmSp
> 69:96.
>
>
> --Ben Zimmer
>
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