hocking loogies

[Benjamin Barrett]

Dave Wilton's link (http://www.wordorigins.org/index.php/site/comments/hawk_a_loogie/) and OED 3 discuss clearing the throat.

As a kid, I was always amazed by the kids that could hock properly--I never could. But it seemed to me it is a gathering of the mucous in the nasal passage, not the throat, and specifically, the collection of a booger accompanied with snot.

Also, I don't see "hock" or "loogie" or other variants in the OED. (Actually, my first attempt to find this word was as hurk, but Google corrected me and elementary school is too distant for me to try to fight it.)

Benjamin Barrett
Seattle, WA

On Oct 13, 2011, at 5:25 AM, Charles C Doyle wrote:

> 
> Those of us who still pronounce "open o's" recognize that the customary spelling of the gerund is "hawking," which corresponds with OED's "hawk" v.3.
> 
> --Charlie
> 
> ________________________________________
> From: American Dialect Society [ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] on behalf of Benjamin Barrett [gogaku at IX.NETCOM.COM]
> Sent: Thursday, October 13, 2011 2:14 AM
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> I don't see this in the OED. Is there another way to express the action of gathering in the nose the mucus required to make a solid mass, surrounded by liquid, in preparation for spitting?
> 
> The Columnist Manifesto wonders whether it makes sense to have a standardized spelling for this (http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:FgAD879HGuQJ:thecolumnistmanifesto.blogspot.com/2005/07/how-do-you-spell-loogie.html+%22hock+a+loogie%22&cd=4&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us).
> 
> Benjamin Barrett
> Seattle, WA

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