I never took it that way. I took it as saying as a way of saying that it is never in the most probable location. Say there are four places I might leave my keys, each in descending order of probability: 1) on the hook by the door, 2) in my pants pocket, 3) on the kitchen counter, or 4) accidentally left in car.
I will look in places #1-3 and then when I find them in #4, I use that expression to convey that I have a horrible lot in life because the fates made me waste time by looking through the most probable places only for the item to be at the least probable.
But the way it is expressed is silly because obviously you stop looking after you find the item. I never understood it to be a joke at all.
I had a friend slowly losing a battle with cancer, and I saw a card that said “The next person who refers to ‘my journey’ better be paying for me to go on a cruise.”
When did “have a nice day” (mere pablum) give way to “have a good one”? Have a good WHAT, I always want to say? Bowel movement? Drive home? Just whatever is going to happen to me next? Can you be a little more specific? Or maybe just be a real throwback to an ancient era and say,
Last week, a checker said “Ok, have a good one!” I replied with a stage whisper "To tells ya the truth, I might just have me a good two… or three…"
And just yesterday, I responded to that same grocery guy who’d just said “Have a nice day!” with “DON’T tell ME what kind of day to have!” and flounced off in a very dramatic huff.
(In both cases, I got a hearty laugh… I love going to Trader Joe’s when my friend’s working there.)
Sometimes, you just don’t have those extra couple of brain cells it takes to figure out whether it’s more appropriate to wish someone a good day or a good night or a good evening or a good weekend or…
Yes, to all of those; as in, “have a good one” is another of my usual expressions. Because why not have a good bowel movement? Or drive home? Or just, whatever? Take it to mean whatever you will, I want you to have a good whatever-it-is; day, month, night, meal, sleep, sexcapade, square dancing session…
I don’t particularly like the expression because it is so cliched, but I have to agree with Kron on this one. I see the lack of specificity as being a feature not a bug. I think it’s quite accommodating that the expression can be applied to whatever the recipient is doing.
Not only is it a tagline - IT’S A SONG! Gah! I hate that stupid song.If you want to know, and I’m sure you don’t, it means that the psoriasis is gone if you take this drug. Nothing = no psoriasis, and that means everything to them. Or something.
This is more of the brain shortcutting to answer the question that it thinks wants to be asked instead of the question that was asked. Drives lawyers crazy.
Q. Who put this chair here?
A. Well, we just thought that someone might want to sit down.
??? The question was “who” put the chair there, not for what purpose it was placed there. But the person is anticipating follow up questions.
But that’s the way language often works. If I ask you, “Is there a restroom nearby?”, I’m actually asking obliquely for the location of said restroom. Anyone who hears that question and simply responds “Yes,” is being a deliberate jerk.
I wasn’t criticizing. It is a normal part of human speech and we are taught in law school to NOT do that when being addressed by a judge. Sometimes this shortcut doesn’t work and a person does not get the question answered.
Perhaps in your example the person was an inspector from the board of health and was checking for compliance with local law, or was a pollster taking a survey and really just wanted to know, full stop, if there was a restroom nearby.
Modern news reports when talking about civilians dying say that “innocent men, women, and children” are being killed. The phrase was originally about innocent “women and children” but due to modern sensibility we have to include men, but that makes the statement nonsensible as it applies to everyone. You might as well just say “civilians.”