"hook up with" in England ...

[Laurence Horn]

On Jan 18, 2013, at 8:46 AM, Amy West wrote:

> On 1/18/13 12:00 AM, Automatic digest processor wrote:
>> Date:    Thu, 17 Jan 2013 10:43:42 -0500
>> From:    "Joel S. Berson"<Berson at ATT.NET>
>> Subject: Re: "hook up with" in England ...
>>
>> At 1/17/2013 08:32 AM, Amy West wrote:
>>> >I first heard of foam parties 20+ years ago in Spain, so no, they're not
>>> >unique to England. I never understood them. But now I see why they might
>>> >be so popular. All I can say is "ewww." I thought peeing in the pool was
>>> >bad enough. . . .
>> What caught my eye is that one (or the other) may go into the foam to
>> grope (or be groped), but goes into "another section" to hook up.
>>
>> Presumably "touch" = "grope."  Does the foam hide the act?
>> And thus "hooking up" must be the (a) next stage after "touching" --
>> in my youth, the stages were called "bases".  (Note: This context
>> seems to provide a fine discrimination for its meaning of "hook
>> up.")  So must the "other section" provide even more invisibility?
>>
>>
> I don't know. The images I've seen show people waist to chest deep in
> foam, so yes, it could hide the act. They may have gone to another
> section for some seclusion of some sort. I dunno. . . We're moving from
> lexicographic issues to other issues that are, uh, tangential and more
> related to my locking up my teens if they ever mention going to a foam
> party.
>
Well, since we're into antedating, it might be mentioned that there were foam parties 80 years ago, one in which "Louis Armstrong dances, sings, and plays his trumpet in a large area of soap suds" and is captured doing so on film; one song performed at that venue is the classic "I'll be glad when you're dead you rascal you".  They were then re-invented in Ibiza (as alluded to above), and surged with the development of the foam cannon.  See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foam_party, but Amy may want to skip the "Safety" note at the bottom…

LH

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