[Ads-l] siftless

[Benjamin Barrett]

My thanks to everyone who figured this out. I just spoke with my dad who 
remembered it as "syphilis," too. I sure remember "siftless" but the 
odds are greatly against me, particularly since I probably wasn't up on 
my VDs at that age.  BB

> Ben Zimmer <mailto:bgzimmer at GMAIL.COM>
> March 29, 2015 at 11:39 PM
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> Sender:       American Dialect Society<ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Ben Zimmer<bgzimmer at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: siftless
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> On Mon, Mar 30, 2015 at 2:23 AM, Ben Zimmer wrote:
>> "You'll get no sympathy from me! You want sympathy, look in the
>> dictionary between shit and syphilis!"
>> --"Major Payne" (1995)
>> http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0110443/quotes
>>
>> Googling for "sympathy," "shit," and "syphilis" reveals many
>> variations on this theme. The earliest I've found is from Grover
>> Lewis's article, "Splendor in the Short Grass: The Making of the Last
>> Picture Show" (_Rolling Stone_, Sept. 2, 1971, reprinted in _Splendor
>> in the Short Grass: The Grover Lewis Reader_, 2005).
>>
>> "In a sudden hush, the cameras begin to roll, but Cybill blows the
>> take by missing her mark parking the convertible. When she stammers
>> out an apology, the sound mixer stage-whispers gruffly: 'Sympathy can
>> be found in the dictionary between shit and syphilis, sister.'"
>>
>> https://books.google.com/books?id=YvMhSH0x8voC&pg=PA27
>> http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/01/25/the-stacks-how-peter-bogdanovich-shot-the-last-picture-show.html
>
> Earlier still:
>
> "I didn't have to look in the dictionary between shit and syphilis for
> sympathy so long as he was available."
> --Hal Travers (pseud. for Gerald B. Lorentz), _Voyage Sixty-Nine_ (1967)
>
> And this cite suggests it's an old hobo maxim:
>
> "There is a saying on the rails: 'You find sympathy between shit and
> syphilis in the dictionary.'"
> --Tracy Kidder&  Michael Mathers, "Hobo Convention," _Audience_
> (Sept.-Oct. 1971, Vol. 1, No. 5)
>
>> Garson has collected some other dictionary-order sayings on Quote Investigator:
>>
>> http://quoteinvestigator.com/2014/10/20/dict/
>> http://quoteinvestigator.com/2014/12/03/duty-pleasure/
>

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