Heya smark folks! Long-time lurker, first-time poster.
Where did we get the phrase “wherever you go, there you are?” It sounds vaguely like something Yogi Berra would say.
I was reminded of it somewhat recently when I saw that SUV commercial ("…Wherever you go, that’s wherever you are, And nobody knows but me"). Did the guy who wrote the copy steal the line from Buckaroo Banzai (“No matter where you go, there you are”)? Or was that a saying before Buckaroo used it?
The Dun King
I first heard it in the movie “[”
[url=http://www.imdb.com/Title?0086856]Buckaroo Bonzai IMDB](http://www.mutantreviewers.com/rbuckaroo.htmlBuckaroo Bonzai[/url)
Welcome to the boards The Dun King! Anyone familiar with Buckaroo Banzai is enough for me to count them as a welcome addition to the SDMB.
The only place I ever heard that phrase was from the movie (actually I think it is the title of a book now too). Occasionally I use the phrase too but I usually get strange glances cast my way when I do.
[sub]I really wish they had made Buckaroo Banzai vs. The World Crime League that was promised at the end of the original movie.[/sub]
I think Jackie Mason’s Borscht Belt schtick predates Buckeroo Banzai by at least three decades:
Whither = to where
Whence = from where
(Whither the English language?)
It was also the subtitle on “The People’s Guide to Mexico” (a very funny “hippie-ish” travel guide. It predates Buckaroo Banzai I’m pretty sure, though it’s definitely later than Jackie Mason’s shtick.
The People’s guide to Mexico definitey used it in print in 1972.
I searched the “Jackie Mason” site but couldn’t find where it was attributed to anyone. Did I miss something?
The author of the 1972 Mexico book says that he heard it on the radio in around 1965. He doesn’t claim credit. http://216.239.51.100/search?q=cache:l_DSYUgdqz0J:www.travelmatters.com/mexico/peoplesguide_mex.html+“people’s+guide+to+mexico”&hl=en&ie=UTF-8
Wow, thanks everyone for the quick replies and welcomes!
Fear Itself - Oy vey, great link. 
Jomo Mojo - D’oh! And here I was, all smug and reasonably sure that I didn’t have any spelling errors, so naturally I disregarded the vocabulary… Thanks for the tip. As to where the English language is going, just check out my Location. It arrived here not long before I did.
FWIW, I am moderately opposed to driving SUVs, and am definitely opposed to their use just for their (dubious) visual appeal. And I recognized that commercial for the pulp that it was. But I absolutely love the poem, even if it seems a little…trite. 
It appeals to me in a Robert Frost kind of way. But then again, I enjoyed Pokemon on the Game Boy as well!
The Dun King
Sorry, the partial quote is attributed to Jackie Mason here.
It is a distortion of one of the most beautiful quotes from the bible. But of course that doesn’t mean it isn’t worth a laugh, in its own right. 
Anyway, I first knew of the quote as the title of a book by Jon Kabat-Zinn. The book was: Wherever You Go, There You Are by Jon Kabat-Zinn.