Swinging a dead cat is a good way to protect oneself from a hissy fest. -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Hannes Reinecke Sent: Tuesday, January 14, 2003 9:03 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [Devel] Re: Another voice
Tony Sweeney wrote: > In British English, it's "never buy a pig in a poke", where 'poke' is > an archaic word for 'bag'. There is another slang phrase, to "let the > cat out of the bag", which is to reveal the truth, for instance that > the pig in the poke is actually a cat. Evidently, passing cats off > unseen as piglets has a long and storied history. > <pedantic> Actually, I seem to remember that the second phrase is more accurately referring to the cat o'nine tails, of old navy fame (i.e. a whip with nine lashes and other niceties). As in 'not enough room to swing a cat'. Which was commonly kept in a bag, lest unsuspecting getting hurt by it. </pedantic> Further follow-ups should be directed to uk.culture.language.english or alt.fan.pratchett (they are really into this :-). > I now return you to the bugzilla hissy-fest. > Indeed. Cheers, Hannes _______________________________________________ Devel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://XFree86.Org/mailman/listinfo/devel _______________________________________________ Devel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://XFree86.Org/mailman/listinfo/devel
