The whole nine yards (1907 - 1916)

[Joel S. Berson]

At 9/8/2013 01:52 PM, Bonnie Taylor-Blake wrote:
>I should note that other ways of looking for "yards" used with respect
>to oral or written accounts (in the sense of sharing of information
>and not literal yards of anything) are to think of "[jokes, for
>example] by the yard" and "[a speech, for example] X yards long."  And
>"gossip" and "tales" and the like are sometimes referred to in terms
>of yardage.

I'm sure -- but without trying to search the various lists! --
"yards" generally leaves out the dimension, and is variously linear,
square, or cubic.  For example, "trucks carrying six (or nine) yards"
must mean cubic.

Joel

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