# Weird things my mother would say **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [November 9, 2026, 10:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weird-things-my-mother-would-say/1034747 "2026-11-09T22:48:42Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Daithi\_Lacha](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/daithi_lacha/32/5430_2.png) [@Daithi\_Lacha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Daithi_Lacha)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2026, 2:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weird-things-my-mother-would-say/1034747/42 "2026-11-10T14:21:17Z")
When my cousin Michael was a little boy, he’d want my dad to play/roughhouse with him. Pop would say, “I can’t play now, Mike, I’ve got a bone in my leg.” ---
**Author:** ![solost](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/solost/32/11776_2.png) [@solost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/solost)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2026, 2:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weird-things-my-mother-would-say/1034747/43 "2026-11-10T14:22:05Z")
How about ‘weird things my Grandmother would say’? My Scottish Grandma had a lot of sayings that I’ve never heard anywhere else. There are many, but I can only think of a couple off the top of my head right now: “Who’s ‘she’, the cat’s mother?” This was in response to us using the female pronoun form in a way that my Grandma found disrespectful; for example, if we complained about our mother (her daughter), saying “she won’t let me have any more dessert!”, we’d get hit with the saying. I think that was the main, or only, reason Grandma used it; she never said, in response to our using the male pronoun to refer to our dad, “Who’s ‘he’, the cat’s father?” “I believe you; thousands wouldn’t.” …in reply to our telling her a fib, or at least something hard to believe. ---
**Author:** ![bibliophage](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bibliophage/32/7615_2.png) [@bibliophage](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bibliophage)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2026, 2:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weird-things-my-mother-would-say/1034747/44 "2026-11-10T14:50:12Z")
“No more goddamn swearing in this house!” ---
**Author:** ![ThelmaLou](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thelmalou/32/390_2.png) [@ThelmaLou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThelmaLou)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2026, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weird-things-my-mother-would-say/1034747/45 "2026-11-10T15:02:10Z")
In response to an insincere apology, my mother would say, _“Sorry doesn’t feed the Admiral’s cat.”_ ---
**Author:** ![Clawdio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/d07c76/32.png) [@Clawdio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Clawdio)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2026, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weird-things-my-mother-would-say/1034747/46 "2026-11-10T15:27:13Z")
Remembered another one, if i ever sat on a table: “Tables are for dishes and glasses, not little boys and their dirty little asses” ---
**Author:** ![dirtball](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dirtball/32/18772_2.png) [@dirtball](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dirtball)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2026, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weird-things-my-mother-would-say/1034747/47 "2026-11-10T15:44:36Z")
My wife was an army brat as a child (before her father retired from the service and their family settled down in the suburban USA when she was a teenager). She spent some time in Germany and picked up a “sub-fluent” level of German while she was there. Consequently, she occasionally poots forth some sort of faux-German phrase. One of her favorites was “Schushen Zie” (no idea how that should be spelled, but I’m assuming it’s derived from “shush”) when the kids were small and got noisy and she wanted them to be quiet. ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2026, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weird-things-my-mother-would-say/1034747/48 "2026-11-10T15:55:25Z")
My stepfather’s reply to any question like “You don’t like spaghetti?” was always “No, it gets in my stomach.” ---
**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:** [November 10, 2026, 3:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weird-things-my-mother-would-say/1034747/49 "2026-11-10T15:56:42Z")
> [@Jasmine](#): > > If I made the same dumb mistake twice: “Fool me once, shame on you but, fool me twice, shame on me!” “Fool me eight or more times…” /Amy Wong My stepfather was probably a sociopath but he dispensed plenty of pithy advice. “Don’t believe anything you hear and only half of what you see.” “Don’t sweat the small stuff. Everything is small stuff.” Oh, and the dreaded, probably universal: “Life isn’t fair.” I’ve had to actively bite my tongue to avoid saying that to my own kid. It’s a true statement. But it’s not like it made me feel any better when it was said to me. I feel like that’s a lesson you have to experience to understand. Years later I made a friend who sounded just like him: “You can only have one number one priority.” “No plan survives first contact with the enemy.” It’s amazing how much of this stuff sticks with me. ---
**Author:** ![Sylvanz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/fbc32d/32.png) [@Sylvanz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sylvanz)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2026, 4:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weird-things-my-mother-would-say/1034747/50 "2026-11-10T16:06:11Z")
o My dad had so many sayings I don’t remember them all until they come out of my mouth. A few I _do_ remember: In answer to “why?” “Why don’t monkeys whistle” We’re all chatting about being hungry: “I’m so hungry my stomach thinks my throat’s been cut!” Discussing a person who has a bit of money, isn’t rich, but thinkns they are: “He’s a ten cent millionair.” Someone he didn’t like who was a bit of a loud mouth: “He’s a big feelin’ asshole” The afore mentioned “People in hell want Ice water.” and lastly my favorite: Shrugging about how stuff was: “No matter where you go there you are.” I wanted to put that on his head stone, but my uncle talked my mom into putting dad in a memory gardens cemetery. No room for pithy sayings. I miss my dad and it’s been over 30 years since he died. Oh yeah, and when we’d say so? he’d say, “Sew stitches and sew your mouth shut.” ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2026, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weird-things-my-mother-would-say/1034747/51 "2026-11-10T16:08:03Z")
One of my mother’s classics was “Let’s not and say we did.” Most commonly heard when we were driving somewhere and spotted a roadside restaurant that she immediately decided looked like a “greasy spoon” (pronounced GREE-zy spoon). ---
**Author:** ![Sylvanz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/fbc32d/32.png) [@Sylvanz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sylvanz)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2026, 4:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weird-things-my-mother-would-say/1034747/52 "2026-11-10T16:09:19Z")
Dad said that too. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Sylvanz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/fbc32d/32.png) [@Sylvanz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sylvanz)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2026, 4:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weird-things-my-mother-would-say/1034747/53 "2026-11-10T16:11:23Z")
Meant to be an edit. ---
**Author:** ![teelabrown](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/teelabrown/32/8412_2.png) [@teelabrown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/teelabrown)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2026, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weird-things-my-mother-would-say/1034747/54 "2026-11-10T16:19:40Z")
Oh, yeah, I forgot a dadism: “Let’s you and him fight.” And “You just weren’t holding your mouth right”, when you failed at some sort of target sport like darts or BB gun shooting. ---
**Author:** ![jsc1953](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/5daacb/32.png) [@jsc1953](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jsc1953)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2026, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weird-things-my-mother-would-say/1034747/55 "2026-11-10T16:24:32Z")
> [@Spice\_Weasel](#): > > Don’t believe anything you hear and only half of what you see.” Famously quoted in “I Heard It Through the Grapevine” but reversed: “People say believe half of what you see, Son, and none of what you hear” ---
**Author:** ![commasense](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/commasense/32/3017_2.png) [@commasense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/commasense)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2026, 4:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weird-things-my-mother-would-say/1034747/56 "2026-11-10T16:56:02Z")
I may have been something of a picky eater when I was a kid, and so my parents were often urging me to try something I had previously refused: “Maybe your tastes have changed.” (It never worked.) My dad would say “mox nix” about something wasn’t important or didn’t matter, a humorous corruption of the German, _macht nichts._ He had been stationed in Germany in the 1950s, and although not fluent, could pronounce the language properly. I got the impression that “mox nix” was common GI slang. ---
**Author:** ![ricepad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/b38774/32.png) [@ricepad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ricepad)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2026, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weird-things-my-mother-would-say/1034747/57 "2026-11-10T19:21:31Z")
> [@Jaycat.again](#): > > > [@kenobi\_65](#): > > > > When we leave the house together, my mom always says either “We’re off like a herd of turtles!”, or the spoonerism “We’re off like a turd of hurdles!” > > “I’m off like a bride’s nightie!” A co-worker’s daughter (at the time she was a recent HS graduate, I think) said, “We’re off like a prom dress!”, to which Don said, “Uh…WHAT??” ---
**Author:** ![muldoonthief](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muldoonthief/32/3188_2.png) [@muldoonthief](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/muldoonthief)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2026, 7:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weird-things-my-mother-would-say/1034747/58 "2026-11-10T19:24:08Z")
When my Aunt didn’t believe something, she would say “I have one word of one syllable. Horseshit.” ---
**Author:** ![furryman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/furryman/32/99_2.png) [@furryman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/furryman)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2026, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weird-things-my-mother-would-say/1034747/59 "2026-11-10T19:28:10Z")
My mom claimed it used to be called Sparrow Grass. (Back in the 30’s) ---
**Author:** ![Eric1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/3bc359/32.png) [@Eric1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eric1)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2026, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weird-things-my-mother-would-say/1034747/60 "2026-11-10T20:23:06Z")
My mother used to say, “Bet them high and sleep in the streets.” Her meaning was that I always hold out a few resources rather than committing absolutely everything. I think it was an observation than advice because the likely effect would be very bad. ---
**Author:** ![stretch](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a6a055/32.png) [@stretch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stretch)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2026, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weird-things-my-mother-would-say/1034747/61 "2026-11-10T20:53:21Z")
> [@teelabrown](#): > > And “You just weren’t holding your mouth right”, when you failed at some sort of target sport like darts or BB gun shooting My grandma said a variant of this to me all the time. I still hear it in my head when I fail. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weird-things-my-mother-would-say/1034747.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/weird-things-my-mother-would-say/1034747.md?page=4)