# Phrases you'd think people would know

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/phrases-youd-think-people-would-know/510178>\
**Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\
**Created:** [September 15, 2009, 3:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/phrases-youd-think-people-would-know/510178 "2009-09-15T15:19:15Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 9

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**Author:** ![Mother](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/76d3ee/32.png) [@Mother](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mother)\
**Post date:** [December 18, 2009, 4:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/phrases-youd-think-people-would-know/510178/161 "2009-12-18T04:37:22Z")

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> [@](#):
>
> Recently my youngest son asked me to compile a list of sayings that I heard as a kid from my Dad and Grandma, who were both country folk from the Ozarks of Arkansas. This is the list of phrases from about 1948 to 1960.

I heard most of these from my mother when I was a child, and I still use some of them. But my mother’s family was from southern Ohio, and never set foot in Arkansas.

Not long ago I used the expression, “can’t make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear,” to someone in their 20s. She looked at me like I’d just arrived in a spaceship. 😃

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**Author:** ![AppallingGael](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b9bd4f/32.png) [@AppallingGael](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AppallingGael)\
**Post date:** [December 18, 2009, 6:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/phrases-youd-think-people-would-know/510178/162 "2009-12-18T06:45:47Z")

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> [@olivesmarch4th](#):
>
> My husband was grading statistics essays, and he found the construction, ‘‘From the gecko, we can see…’’
> 
> It took him a minute to figure out the author meant, ‘‘from the get-go.’’
> 
> From the gecko? _Really?_

I remember that one from the [eggcorn database](http://eggcorns.lascribe.net/) (just linked to the opening page, but it’s in there somewhere).

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**Author:** ![Springtime\_for\_Spacers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Springtime\_for\_Spacers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Springtime_for_Spacers)\
**Post date:** [December 18, 2009, 5:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/phrases-youd-think-people-would-know/510178/163 "2009-12-18T17:54:40Z")

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[quote=“1920s Style “Death Ray”, post:157, topic:510178”]

I’ve always thought of “caught short” as meaning left unprepared in a general way, I hadn’t been aware of the specific pregnancy angle.  
[/QUOTE]

I’m in the UK and I know “caught short” as meaning needing to use the loo rather badly in the absence of a suitable toilet as in “I was caught short and had to find a bush to go behind.”

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**Author:** ![Spice\_Weasel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spice_weasel/32/5435_2.png) [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)\
**Post date:** [December 19, 2009, 12:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/phrases-youd-think-people-would-know/510178/164 "2009-12-19T00:05:17Z")

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> [@AppallingGael](#):
>
> I remember that one from the [eggcorn database](http://eggcorns.lascribe.net/) (just linked to the opening page, but it’s in there somewhere).

Ok, that site is hilarious. ‘‘Sarah Palin and her elk…’’

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