[Ads-l] RES: see a man about a horse or dog

[David Daniel]

Thanks, Garson.
DAD

-----Mensagem original-----
De: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] Em nome de
ADSGarson O'Toole
Enviada em: terça-feira, 23 de novembro de 2021 02:32
Para: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Assunto: Re: see a man about a horse or dog

Poster:       ADSGarson O'Toole <adsgarsonotoole at GMAIL.COM>
Subject:      Re: see a man about a horse or dog
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Way back in June 2011 a thread was initiated about "see a man about a dog".
The message featured an 1865 citation together with links to pertinent
articles at World Wide Words and Wikipedia.
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ads-l/2011-June/110247.html

Word Histories has an article now (posted in 2017)
https://wordhistories.net/2017/11/09/see-man-about-dog/

Bill Mullins mentioned the variant "see a man about a mule".
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ads-l/2011-June/110255.html

Joel S. Berson started a thread focused on "see a man about a horse"
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ads-l/2011-June/110262.html

I posted an 1891 citation for "see a man about a horse"
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ads-l/2011-June/110285.html

Garson

On Mon, Nov 22, 2021 at 11:56 PM David Daniel <dad at coarsecourses.com> wrote:
>
> Going back to the 1950s when I was a kid, my dad would say he had to 
> "see a man about a horse" when going to the bathroom. Thus, of course, 
> I have spent my whole life with that in my going-to-the-bathroom 
> repertoire. But an Irish friend of mine, when in the same situation, says
"see a man about a dog."
> We've had some humorous exchanges over the "correctness" of the two 
> versions, so I checked them out. Both get a similar number of Google 
> hits (horse - 679,000, dog - 721,000), but many sources claim it is 
> British usage. Yet there was my dad, born and raised in Indiana, 
> saying it on a regular basis back in the 1950s and onward. It's 
> possible he picked it up in England in WWII, but I have no way of 
> knowing. Does anyone out there have any experience with the expression 
> or info about which side or sides of the pond it came from?
> DAD
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org