Colloquialism: to see a man about a dog

[Laurence Horn]

At 11:23 AM -0400 6/16/11, George Thompson wrote:
>My father was born in Brooklyn in the early 1890s.

Mine too, only it was the late 1890s.  I don't remember him seeing a
man about either a dog or a horse though, or at least not in so many
words.  In fact I can't remember who I heard actually using the
expression.  Might have been someone(s) in a movie or TV show, in
which case my NYC background would be of limited relevance.

LH

>Ca. 1950 he would use
>"see a man about a dog" at least sometimes to mean that he was going to
>leave my mother and me to find a bar and have a beer.
>
>GAT
>
>On Thu, Jun 16, 2011 at 7:43 AM, Joel S. Berson <Berson at att.net> wrote:
>
>>  At 6/16/2011 04:10 AM, Wilson Gray wrote:
>>
>>   On Wed, Jun 15, 2011 at 1:12 PM, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu>
>>>  wrote:
>>>  > I remember it as "see a man about a horse."
>>>
>>
>>  IIRC, Larry grew up in NYC.  As did I, but I remember it as "dog".
>>
>>  Joel
>>
>>
>>   As do I. FWIW, only in Saint Louis, used in front of the ladies and
>>>  the chirren by men of my parents' age. We masculine children used
>>>  "take a leak," as our elders most likely did, too, when out of earshot
>>>  of childring and ladies.
>>>
>>>  OTOH, I didn't learn "take a _dump_" till I was in the Army.
>>>
>>>  Horse-drawn milk trucks, junk wagons, and other such vehicles were
>>>  common of the streets till some time After The War.
>>>
>>>  --
>>>  -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
>>>
>>>  ------------------------------------------------------------
>>>  The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>>
>>
>>  ------------------------------------------------------------
>>  The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>
>
>
>
>--
>George A. Thompson
>Author of A Documentary History of "The African Theatre", Northwestern Univ.
>Pr., 1998, but nothing much since then.
>
>------------------------------------------------------------
>The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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