"fish" (was Re: "moist")

[Jonathan Lighter]

Quite apposite.

JL

On Wed, Nov 9, 2011 at 10:41 PM, Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com> wrote:
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> Poster:       Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: "fish" (was Re: "moist")
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>
> It was a blind man
> By the name of "Dell"
> He couldn't see
> But he sure could smell
> Passed the fish market the other day
> Said, 'Scuse me, ladies.
> Y'all going my way?
> He was a smelling mother for you
> Don't you know?
> He was a sniffing mother for you
> Don't you know?
> He was a smelling mother for you
> I ain't going to tell you no lie
>
> --Â -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
>
> On Wed, Nov 9, 2011 at 7:39 AM, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com> wrote:
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>> Poster: Â  Â  Â  Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
>> Subject: Â  Â  Â Re: "fish" (was Re: "moist")
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>>
>>> We can agree that _fish_ 'woman' comes from _fish_ 'fish.' Â The
>>> semantic details remain obscure.
>>
>> Along with the actual frequency and distribution of the term. And
>> that, I should think, is that.
>>
>> JL
>>
>>
>> On Tue, Nov 8, 2011 at 4:05 PM, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com> wrote:
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>>> Sender: Â  Â  Â  American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>> Poster: Â  Â  Â  Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
>>> Subject: Â  Â  Â Re: "fish" (was Re: "moist")
>>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>
>>
>>>
>>> An olfactory explanation of _fish_ would be far more plausible if
>>> dismissive, metonymic, olfactory  designations for  certain kinds of
>>> people were common, but they're not. While I've heard crude masculine
>>> allusions to the odor in question, I can't say that I've encountered
>>> them more than three or four times in my entire life as a guy.
>>> Non-olfactory terms for women, some highly disdainful, are of course
>>> extremely common.
>>>
>>> I believe that the alternative line of development that I suggested
>>> has at least the virtue of being more semantically conventional. Â But
>>> the 8/7,000,000,000 of the world's population that really cares about
>>> this matter will have to draw their own conclusions, or else develop
>>> their own theories.
>>>
>>> JL
>>>
>>> On Tue, Nov 8, 2011 at 1:52 PM, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu> wrote:
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>>>> Poster: Â  Â  Â  Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
>>>> Subject: Â  Â  Â Re: "fish" (was Re: "moist")
>>>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>>
>>>> On Nov 8, 2011, at 1:39 PM, Charles C Doyle wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Ron wirtes, "I can't think of a slang term for codgers that is based on the putative urine smell of old people, but if there were one (there perhaps isn't only because  piss doesn't smell like anything but piss), I woudn't think of it as neoFreudian."
>>>>>
>>>>> Growing up in Texas, I always used to hear that Pearl Beer tastes like horse's piss (and I used to wonder who did the taste test). Â Perhaps (reversing the direction of the figure) codgers could be termed "Pearlies." Â NonneoFreudianly, of course.
>>>>>
>>>> Or as Pearls. Â Allowing one to hold open the door for one's elders while announcing "Pearls before swine".
>>>>
>>>> LH
>>>>
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>>
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>> "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."
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