gripe

[James Smith]

"Gripes me" (more common) or "gripes _someone_" (less common) are ordinary usage to me and those I associate with.  They sound absolutely natural to me.

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 Mon, 10/18/10, Arnold Zwicky <zwicky at STANFORD.EDU> wrote:

> From: Arnold Zwicky <zwicky at STANFORD.EDU>
> Subject: Re: gripe
> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> Date: Monday, October 18, 2010, 11:36 AM
> On Oct 18, 2010, at 10:06 AM, Jon
> Lighter wrote:
> >
> > As HDAS reveals, to "gripe someone" has been pretty
> frequent at the slang
> > level in the 20th Century. (First ex., 1927). The
> usual nuance, however, is
> > "to anger or annoy," generally with an inanimate
> subject.
>
> (i'd gloss it roughly as 'piss someone off', but without
> the taboo tinge.)
>
> the usage is natural for me, so natural that i have no idea
> how long i've been saying it.  but i *have* had the
> experience of it causing other people to break out in
> asterisks, so that i've been aware for some time that it's
> not exactly widespread.
> >
> > My experience tends to confirm that it is has not been
> common in the
> > Northeast.  It may be a little old-fashioned
> these days.
>
> no idea what its geographical/social distribution is like.
>
> my own linguistic experience was all in (various parts of)
> the Northeast until i was 25. of course that was a long time
> ago.
>
> arnold
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>

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