so, that happened

[James Smith]

I don't recall ever hearing this phrase.


James D. SMITH               |If history teaches anything
South SLC, UT                |it is that we will be sued
jsmithjamessmith at yahoo.com   |whether we act quickly and
                                    decisively
                             |or slowly and cautiously.


--- On Fri, 2/26/10, Ann Burlingham <ann at BURLINGHAMBOOKS.COM> wrote:

> From: Ann Burlingham <ann at BURLINGHAMBOOKS.COM>
> Subject: so, that happened
> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> Date: Friday, February 26, 2010, 9:30 AM
> i was recently reading amy
> dickinson's _the mighty queens of freeville_,
> in which she quotes her daughter as saying, after a
> disaster (the high
> school madrigal group crashed through the stage floor),
> "Well, *that*
> happened". (p. 170) the phrase is familiar to me - more
> perhaps as "so, that
> happened", and i came across it again somewhere else in the
> last few days,
> too, and both times wondered when and where this sprang
> from. I'm
> familiar with it - not sure if i've used it - but i
> couldn't say where
> it's from. in googling, i found a comment here
> http://www.gnomestew.com/gming-advice/narrative-phrases
> from
> shadoeknight (about halfway down) that the usage was used
> in "state &
> main" by alec baldwin's character. i'm guessing it didn't
> originate
> there, but, unless i'm suffering from recency bias, it
> feels like a
> newer phrase to me. is this a phrase you use? do you hear
> it or see it, too?
>
>
> -ann burlingham
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>

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