"Go _balls-out_"

[Wilson Gray]

On Tue, Feb 11, 2014 at 8:32 AM, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com>wrote:

> It certainly is possible, but I've never seen any evidence to suggest it
> was true.
>
> Or that any alternative explanation was, for that matter. I mean, why would
> anybody going fast have his testicles out? And if so, why just his
> testicles?
>

That's my feeling, too. That is, the fact that it's hard to picture the
phrase as based on anything actually having to do with the testes is
precisely what makes the steam-engine analysis seem plausible.

The talking head said that the expression "doesn't have the origin that you
might think" - I suspect that, in fact, very few people have ever pondered
this question - and went on to give the fly-ball-governor creation-story.
According to him, at the height of the Age of Steam, it wasn't unusual for
a steam engine to go balls-out for weeks at a time.

But, a simple "go all-out" > "go balls-out" sounds reasonable, too, as does
the reverse.

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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