"dim <someone's> daylights", 1800 (UNCLASSIFIED)

Tue Aug 23 17:54:25 UTC 2011

Classification: UNCLASSIFIED
Caveats: NONE

> -----Original Message-----
> From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On
> Behalf Of Joel S. Berson
> Sent: Tuesday, August 23, 2011 11:19 AM
> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> Subject: Re: "dim <someone's> daylights", 1800
>
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
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> --------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET>
> Subject:      Re: "dim <someone's> daylights", 1800
>
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> --------
>
> At 8/22/2011 10:02 PM, Dan Goncharoff wrote:
> >Did it ever change to headlights? I might still get inclined to knock
> >the living daylights out of somebody.
> >DanG
>
> But would you be inclined to knock the living *headlights* out of
> somebody?  Daylights are part of human anatomy (or something), and
> can be called "living"; headlights are part of mechanical anatomy,
> and can be literally dimmed, via a switch.
>

But "headlights" can be part of the anatomy, as well:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Headlights_(comics)

Classification: UNCLASSIFIED
Caveats: NONE

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