Ya gotta be from Texas - here's a turn of phrase

[Woodmonkey]

Before you turn the page, here’s a turn of phrase

Remember that time when your key ring got in some kind of tangle and you wrestled it for an hour to no avail? Then some yahoo in your office walks up and untangles the mess in about eight seconds.

What do they say?

“You just gotta hold your tongue right,” they smugly remark before walking away in a cloud of superiority.

What in blue blazes does that mean? Hold your tongue right? Does that exponentially escalate your intelligence? Did they use their tongue to untangle the keys? What does the tongue have to do with the price of tea in China?

Have you ever thought about the phrase?

Chances are you haven’t.

Instead, you just smile and go on about your business as if the keys never got tangled and the comment was never made. We don’t react because, at least here in West Texas, we’re used to the remark.

We’ve heard it. We’ve said it. We probably even believe in it.

I get a kick out of word phrases and word plays, so I love it whenever I hear a new one. And I try to use them whenever I can. Alas, sometimes the phrases can bring awkward stares.

I once said, “He’s all hat and no cattle,” while listening to a speaker at a conference in Washington, D.C. The woman next to me looked at me like I had grown a third eyeball in the middle of my forehead.

She was from California. I guess that’s not an expression commonly used in the suburbs of San Francisco because she had no clue what it meant.
My readers are probably well aware that the phrase means someone is putting on airs or that they are all flash and no substance.

It may be hard to explain the phrase without using another phrase, but we just have an intuitive understanding of what the saying means.

The same holds true with, “Lower than a snake’s belly in a wagon rut.”
I must admit some cliches don’t make sense out of context. For instance, “way out in left field” means you’re an odd duck, but if Albert Pujols is at the plate, you better be playing way out in left field.

Here are some of my favorite sayings:

We’ve howdied, but we ain’t shook hands.

It’s so dry, my duck doesn’t know how to swim.

He’s as confused as a cow on Astroturf.

He ain’t the brightest bulb in the chandelier.

I’m so broke I can’t pay attention.

Worse off than a rubber-nosed woodpecker in a petrified forest.

He’s dumber than a box of rocks.

This is about as exciting as watching paint dry.

He’s more nervous than a long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs

Busier than a one-legged man in a butt-kicking contest.

This ain’t my first rodeo.

And my all-time favorite: “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over while expecting a different outcome.”

The Source

[conlor]

I sent these to two of my sisters. One lived in TX 30 years ago, the other lives in Austin now.

[Woodmonkey]

I love the way the Texans talk.

[conlor]

I lived in TX for about 6 months after I graduated from high school. People would come in where I was working who had other accents mixed in with the TX accents and it was so hard to understand them. I mean people who's parents immigrated from other countries. I could understand the straight TX accents, but trying to understand the mixture was embarrassing. I'd have to get my manager to help translate. She already understood the TX part. LOL. After being in the Army and moving around, it probably wouldn't be as difficult, but I'd never lived in the south until then.

[Woodmonkey]

Originally Posted by conlor

I lived in TX for about 6 months after I graduated from high school. People would come in where I was working who had other accents mixed in with the TX accents and it was so hard to understand them. I mean people who's parents immigrated from other countries. I could understand the straight TX accents, but trying to understand the mixture was embarrassing. I'd have to get my manager to help translate. She already understood the TX part. LOL. After being in the Army and moving around, it probably wouldn't be as difficult, but I'd never lived in the south until then.

Moving around helps you to figure out what people with different accents are saying. I guess it's just having to develop that over time.

I remember one Russian immigrant woman who stopped me in a local store, one of those that have everything from food to electronics to clothes to a complete pharmacy plus more. I felt sorry for her because she needed something so took the time to really listen. After about 10 minutes, I finally figured out that she needed to buy a douche kit. That was one happy woman when she finally got one.

[conlor]

One of my sisters was working at KMart's several years ago. Some Middle Eastern men were buying things to send back home to their families. She's never lived in another city or state. She finally figured out they were purchasing 'sanitary' items but didn't know how much to buy. They were asking her how many she used per month. LMAO!!! She thought that was too personal a question and wouldn't tell them. She just put several boxes in their cart.