OT, essentially: You really never know!

[Margaret Lee]

My children (1 son and 3 daughters) grew up in the '70's (in Tidewater, VA) and used the rhyme among themselves and their friends. In fact, the girls used it more than my son.  
They also used a similar rhyme in response to someone telling them to "shut up":
"Shut don't go up, prices do, so take my advice and shut up too."

--Margaret Lee  

________________________________
 From: Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU 
Sent: Tuesday, November 27, 2012 5:33 PM
Subject: OT, essentially: You really never know!
  
Heard on Reno 911!:

Pre-adolescent karate kid who has freaked out, causing the sensei to
call the police

A. "Shut up!"

Colored Reno cop S[ven] Jones:

B. "I don't *shut* up,
I *grow* up!
And every time I look at *you*,
I *throw* up!"


Until now, not only did I think that B was peculiar to Saint Louis,
but also that it was even specific to the playground of the grade
school that I attended. Besides that, only little kids used it, not
the big boys. (The school being Catholic, the playground was, well,
segregated. So, I don't know whether girls also used this rap.) The
last time that I heard it or said it was probably during the 1945-46
school-year, when I was around eight-nine years old.

According to W:pedia, Cedric "Jonesy" Yarborough "was born born March
20, 1973 in Burnsville, Minnesota. Yarbrough attended Burnsville
Senior High School and later Minnesota State University, Mankato. He
is also an alumnus of Dudley Riggs's Brave New Workshop in
Minneapolis."

So, no connection to StL and St. Bernadette School in either time or
space and the same is true of the writers, assuming that B wasn't an
ad-lib.

Youneverknow.
--
-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

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