[Ads-l] Do we do gestures? II

[Jonathan Lighter]

George's post comes just as I was considering a second gesture.

>From Englishman John Brophy's semi-autobiographical novel of WW1, _The
Bitter End_ (1928), referring to 1917-18:

"There was current at the time a slang phrase used to express intense
pleasure and triumph and accompanied by a gesture  of the fingers. Everyone
not too genteel used it, in this sense, but among coarser and more knowing
people it passed as a euphemism for the sexual act performed
illicitly....The soldiers were of course aware of the double meaning."

Q:  What slang phrase? What gesture? (The OK sign?)

Any suggestions?

BTW, the only time other than in the "Night Before" that I recall seeing
(or even reading about) George and Clement's Santa gesture was in the 1955
movie of _Moby Dick_, where it seems to suggest "You know what I mean,
right?"

JL
-- 
"If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."

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