Fwd: Re: _Kiss my grits!_ = "Kiss my ass!," by a writer for The Family Guy

[Alice Faber]

On 5/31/11 8:55 PM, Laurence Horn wrote:
>> Date: Tue, 31 May 2011 20:30:33 -0400
>> Sender: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> From: Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
>> Subject: Re: _Kiss my grits!_ = "Kiss my
>> ass!," by a writer for The Family
>> Guy
>> ...
>> "Toe cheese" I don't know, although a related form of "cheese" (as in
>> crotch cheese) surfaces elsewhere as an alternate realization of
>> smegma.
>
> I should have noted that both these referents
> fall together in HDAS, s.v. _cheese_ 3:
> smegma; (also) grimy matter between the toes
>
> (Since I'm currently listening to a Frank Conroy
> audiobook, I found like the lone toe-cite from
> Conroy's _The Great Santini_ particularly apt: "I
> consider the Navy the cheese between the Marine
> Corps' toes". The other cites are all smegmatic
> and hence far more colorful.
>
> Nothing relevant for "grits", though. And since
> we don't have the T volume (curse you, Random
> House!), we may never know if "tochus" derives
> from the "toe Käse".

Assuming Larry isn't being facetious (never a safe assumption), "tochus"
is a Yiddishization of the Hebrew "tochet" (initial stress), meaning
"bottom", with unexceptional phonetic changes.
--
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Alice Faber                                       faber at haskins.yale.edu
Haskins Laboratories                            tel: (203) 865-6163 x258
New Haven, CT 06511 USA                               fax (203) 865-8963

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