Does anyone know the origin of this expression? My mother uses it (and picked it up from her mother) in a sarcastic manner, but in different contexts. Like just now, she said it after my father pointed out something obvious.
Hi beautiful!
I don’t know the expression, but I do know that Margaret Truman was the daughter of President Truman. She was a, well, matronly-looking gal, and wanted to work as a concert singer.
There was a famous incident when a reviewer spoke in disparaging terms of her performance and Truman spoke in a very unpresidential manner of what he’d like to do to the fellow, much to the delight of the press.
So the words dowdy and amateurish come to my mind when her name is mentioned.
Now either someone else will comne in and expand on this, or will demonstrate that she was a fabulous singer with a great figure, and I’m an australian idiot!
Now stay out of trouble, won’t you?
Uncle Redboss
I know nothing about the expression, but from this site I’ll make a guess:
http://www.stopyourekillingme.com/Bio/Bio-Margaret-Truman.html
Perhaps with those radio programs, she was known for giving a lot of useless information.
Redboss has proven not to be an Australia idiot. I can remember as a boy that they joked about her looks. She was not beautiful, but not as bad as they said. Some things never change.