FAMILIAR PHRASES

We’d never try double-cross you, so we had to include some of our favorite phrase origins (and this is no red herring). Here they are, just in the nick of time….

RED HERRING

Meaning: Distraction; diversionary tactic

Origin: When a herring is smoked, it changes from silvery gray to brownish red and gives off a strong smell. Hunters use red herrings to train dogs to follow a scent. By dragging a red herring across the trail, they can also throw a dog off a scent.

EASY AS PIE

Meaning: Simple to complete

Origin: This phrase came from New Zealand, by way of Australia, in the 1920s. When someone was good at something, they were considered “pie at it” or “pie on it.” For example, a good climber was “pie at climbing.” Although the modern phrase is associated with pie (the dessert), it is actually derived from the Maori word pai, which means “good.”

HUMBLE PIE

Meaning: To apologize and face humiliation for a serious error

Origin: In the 14th century, the Middle English word for the innards of an animal—the heart, liver, intestines, etc.—was numbles, and later umbles. Using them to make pies was common for poor people. Sometime in the 1800s, umble became associated with humble, and it became common to say that someone who had been humiliated in some way had eaten “humble pie.”

COLD SHOULDER

Meaning: To ignore someone out of spite

Origin: The first recorded use of this phrase appeared in Sir Walter Scott’s 1816 novel The Antiquary: “The Countess’s dislike didna gang farther at first than just showing o’ the cauld shouther.” Etymologists disagree on its origin—some claim that Scott invented it, probably referencing a dismissive movement of a shoulder. Others argue that it came from a custom going back to the Middle Ages: Dinner guests who stayed too long were given a “cold shoulder” of meat rather than a cooked one as a hint that it was time to leave.

DOUBLE-CROSS

Meaning: Betray

Origin: Comes from boxing and describes a fixed fight. If a fighter deliberately loses, he “crosses up” the people who have bet on him to win; if he wins, he “crosses up” the people paying him to lose. Someone is betrayed no matter how the fight turns out; hence the name “double-cross.”

KEEPING UP WITH THE JONESES

Meaning: Striving to match one’s neighbors in spending and social standing

Origin: Created by New York cartoonist “Pop” Momand in 1913 as the title of a comic strip in the New York Globe that showed middle-class people living beyond their means. It was originally going to be called “Keeping Up with the Smiths,” but Momand changed it at the last minute because he thought “Joneses” sounded better.

GOBBLEDYGOOK

Meaning: Unnecessary jargon that’s used when simple words will do

Origin: U.S. Representative Maury Maverick (D-TX)—grandson of Samuel Maverick, from whom we get the word maverick—once compared his fellow lawmakers to turkeys: “They’re always gobbledy-gobbling and strutting around with ludicrous pomposity!” While chairman of the Smaller War Plants Corporation in 1944, Maverick sent out a memo: “No more gobbledygook language! Anyone using the words ‘activation’ or ‘implementation’ will be shot!”

IN THE NICK OF TIME

Meaning: Without a second to spare

Origin: Even into the 18th century, some businessmen still kept track of transactions and time by carving notches—or nicks—on a “tally stick.” One arriving just before the next nick was carved would save the next day’s interest…just in the nick of time.

While many Western languages, such as Spanish, Italian, and French, are Latin-based, English isn’t—it’s mostly derived from German.