"Love bug"
Darla Wells
lethe9 at GMAIL.COM
Mon Feb 14 00:33:01 UTC 2011
When I lived in Wichita Falls, Texas, love bugs were those little black bugs
that were physically attached to each other and that ended up all over
people's car windows in the spring. Not sure what they were doing as I know
nothing at all about bug sex, but that's sure what it looked like, hence the
name.
Darla
2011/2/12 Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com>
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> Sender: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster: Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject: "Love bug"
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> I've always understood "love bug" to refer to a mythical insect whose
> bite causes a person - will-he, nill-he - to fall in love. A popular
> R&B song of my youth discussed this very phenomenon.
>
> However, as my wife uses the term, "love bug" refers to a being, human
> or otherwise, that desires and enjoys "loving," i.e. being fondled,
> stroked, petted, tickled, etc. She often applies it to our kitties.
>
> Of course, I'm also familiar with "Love Bug" as the title of a movie
> featuring a VW beetle or "bug.".
>
> --
> -Wilson
> -----
> 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.
> -Mark Twain
>
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> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>
--
If you can't be a good example, then you'll just have to be a horrible
warning. -Catherine Aird
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