[Ads-l] "Monkey this up"

[Jonathan Lighter]

In my experience, "throw a wrench into" is more common among the TV
chatterers than "throw a monkey wrench into" - though the latter is the
only version I grew up with.

JL

On Fri, Aug 31, 2018 at 7:03 AM Stephen Goranson <goranson at duke.edu> wrote:

> Why wasn't 't a monkey spanner?
>
> Unconfirmed from British Newspaper Archive:
>
> .. the following answers: —l first asked how much pressure he had on the
> safety-valve beyond the ball, and he replied, A monkey spanner (that is a
> screw-hammer) and a key: this weight we frequently carry. I next asked him
> whether he noticed the height of ...
> Published: Friday 28 February 1851
> Newspaper: Stamford Mercury<
> https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/search/results?newspaperTitle=Stamford%20Mercury
> >
> County: Lincolnshire, England
> Type: Article | Words: 11459 | Page: 4 | Tags: none
>
> SG
>
>
> ________________________________
> From: American Dialect Society <> on behalf of W Brewer<>
> Sent: Friday, August 31, 2018 2:33 AM
> To:
> Subject: Re: [ADS-L] "Monkey this up"
>
> grease monkey
> OTOH, when I think of <grease monkey>, I think of my lily-white father who
> spent his whole life tinkering with car, bus, & aircraft engines. He only
> used a <monkey wrench>, however, for home plumbing repair. He even monkeyed
> around on the roof into his eighties.
> <
> https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__www.americandialect.org&d=DwIBaQ&c=imBPVzF25OnBgGmVOlcsiEgHoG1i6YHLR0Sj_gZ4adc&r=uUVa-8oDL2EzfbuMuowoUadHHcJ7pjul6iFkS5Pd--8&m=6tz-XOSQ85q8JOqlby1kcLx7eWlDsBwQKfSkmjZ0S6I&s=VS5twVSQHqqTY38SGGaJ0Uyvs0otRL5QxoFz7CkLSuk&e=
> >
>
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"If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."

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