# Cloud 9 **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [September 21, 2001, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cloud-9/83038 "2001-09-21T16:31:08Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![greatness1811](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/77aa72/32.png) [@greatness1811](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/greatness1811)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2001, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cloud-9/83038/1 "2001-09-21T16:31:08Z")
Where does the origin of “being on cloud 9” come from…and what exactly is it supposed to mean? ---
**Author:** ![WordMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e8c25b/32.png) [@WordMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WordMan)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2001, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cloud-9/83038/2 "2001-09-21T16:42:58Z")
From the Word Detective ([www.word-detective.com](http://www.word-detective.com)) Dear Word Detective: I was fascinated by your explanation of “twenty-three skidoo.” You started me wondering about “cloud nine.” Is it perchance older than we think, or did it come out about the same time of “catch 22,” all wonderful numerical expressions? – Dick Wilcox, via the internet. Well, that depends on how old we think it is. How many of us are in here, anyway? We gotta get some decent lighting in this column – it’s so dark I can’t see a thing. But seriously, Dick, there’s a pretty broad range of time covered by those phrases. “Twenty-three skidoo” appeared around the end of the 19th century, while “Catch 22” was invented by author Joseph Heller in his 1961 novel of the same name. “Cloud nine” seems to have first appeared around 1935, though it didn’t become widespread until the 1950’s. Exactly how “on cloud nine” came to be synonymous with “euphoria” or “perfect contentment” is a bit of a mystery. According to my parents’ “Morris Dictionary of Word and Phrase Origins,” the phrase is based on U.S. Weather Service terminology. This theory holds that cloud types are numbered, and that “cloud nine” is the designation given to “cumulonimbus” clouds, the highest-flying clouds around, making them an apt metaphor for being “on top of the world.” It’s a nice story, and I usually defer to my parents’ wisdom, but I don’t believe this one. Part of the problem is that when the phrase first appeared, it wasn’t “cloud nine” – more often, folks said they were on “cloud seven,” or even “cloud thirty-nine.” Another glitch in the “cumulonimbus” (love that word) theory is that “cloud nine” gained currency as a popular idiom among jazz musicians and the Beat Generation, groups not ordinarily noted for their embrace of meteorological terminology. My best guess is that “on cloud nine” is simply a “cool” (by the standards of the 1950’s) metaphor for the “floating,” transcendent state induced by good jazz and perhaps a “stimulant” or two. More Maynard G. Krebs, in other words, than Mister Wizard. ---
**Author:** ![Chez\_Guevara](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/aeb1de/32.png) [@Chez\_Guevara](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chez_Guevara)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2001, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cloud-9/83038/3 "2001-09-21T20:31:39Z")
**cloud.** _n._ **1.** [late 17C-18C] tobacco, tobacco smoke. **cloud nine** _n._ [1960’s+] a state of bliss, often drug-induced. **2.** [1980’s+] (drugs) crack cocaine. [according to **Brewer** (1995) the term stems from the classification of clouds by the US Weather Bureau. There are 9 divisions, and number 9 is cumulonimbus, a cumulus cloud of great vertical extent, topped with shapes that resemble mountains or towers]. **cloud seven** _n._ [1960’s+] a state of bliss, often drug induced. [var. on _cloud nine_; presumably less blissful, but 7 is traditionally a ‘lucky’ number]. Well, I am glad I look up this item, as it appears that _cloud seven_ is nothing but grass which is by no means effective, and when I contact my dealer I say to him: **Nostradamus** : 'I wish a small quantity of _cloud nine_, if it is not too much trouble. **Suspicious Character On Street Corner** : ‘Why, I am fresh out of _cloud nine_, but there is plenty of _cloud seven_, if you do not mind, and I greatly recommend this product, which is more than blissful in its effect’. **Nostradamus** : ‘Goodbye.’ 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Crafter\_Man](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crafter_man/32/458_2.png) [@Crafter\_Man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crafter_Man)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2001, 8:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cloud-9/83038/4 "2001-09-21T20:56:09Z")
Western Resrve Brewing Co. makes a _great_ Belgian White Beer called **Clound 9** : [http://wrbrew.com/beers/cloudnine.htm](http://wrbrew.com/beers/cloudnine.htm) I’ve had it. Yum yum.