QUIZ: Is This A Quote From My 5-Year-Old Or An Old Timey Expression That Fell Out Of Style?
Tyler is in his Don Rickles phase right now.
“Heyya, horse teeth! How’s the biz?”
A: My 5-year-old. Tyler is in his Don Rickles phase right now.
“No good fish”
A: Old timey expression. It emerged in the American lexicon after the Great Drunk Fish Affair of 1919, when all the sturgeon in the Santa Ana River became inebriated from whiskey contamination. This incident was, of course, the catalyst for national Prohibition, which began the following year.
“Don’t care, don’t care, I can see your underwear!”
A: 5-year-old. Tyler likes to plug his ears and sing this line whenever I talk about my job as an American History professor.
“Ugly man, ugly man, stupid yucky ugly man”
A: Old timey expression. People who viewed the Kennedy-Nixon debate on television in 1960 observed that Richard Nixon looked stupid and yucky, openly mocking his stupid yucky ugliness until his death. Historians believe Nixon’s famously grotesque appearance resulted from the abundance of inebriated sturgeon he consumed during the Great Drunk Fish Affair.
“Show me your PP”
A: Both.
5-year-old — Tyler is captivated by the general concept of penises right now. 5-10 times each day, he proposes, “I’ll show you mine if you show me yours” to his father.
Old timey expression — “Show me your PP” was a secret code that 1920s Brooklyn Italians whispered to a chef, who responded with, “Show me what-a that mouth-a can do!” The chef would then lead the Italians to a back room where the restaurant kept its “illegal” PP (pizza pies). Due to the language barrier, they misunderstood which “special sauce” was banned under Prohibition.
“You silly goose”
A: Technically an old timey expression of unidentified authorship. But if I’m being honest, I was in a park dictating this quiz on my phone using talk-to-text when I suddenly came upon a silly looking goose. The park is the only place I can prepare my lessons these days.
“Mister Whiskers whispers”
A: An old timey expression referring to the whiskey brand Mister Whiskers — the alcohol of choice for American soldiers in WWI (and my go-to for drowning out Tyler’s ceaseless racket). Mister Whiskers “whispers” because although the company was found responsible for the Great Drunk Fish Affair of 1919, it continued distilling whiskey in secret throughout Prohibition. For historical accuracy, I “whispered” some Mister Whiskers of my own while composing this quiz.
“Hide the bugs”
A: 5-year-old. Despite my pleas, Tyler continues stuffing fistfuls of bugs into my bed every night.
“Watch your back”
A: Both. It’s an old timey expression that Tyler ominously whispered before planting an outraged dung beetle of unknown origins on my back.
“Poop! Poop! Poop! Poop! Poop! Poop! Poop! Poopy! Poop! Poop! Poop! Poop! Poop! Poop! Poop! Pee pee! Poo! Poopy pee pee! Poop! Poop! Poop! Poopy!”
A: An old timey chorus that soldiers in The Great War sang whenever they shit in the trenches. It became widely popular in the United States after the troops returned from Europe:
There’s poop in all our trousers and there’s poop in every trench We go to sleep on poop pillows and wake up to poop stench I went to see the doctor, Mister Whiskers was his name And though I took his “medicine,” my poop still smelled the same
Poop! Poop! Poop! Poop! Poop! Poop! Poop! Poopy! Poop! Poop! Poop! Poop! Poop! Poop! Poop! Pee pee! Poo! Poopy pee pee! Poop! Poop! Poop! Poopy!
“Give me back my medicine, you meddling goose!”
A: An old timey expression that was weirdly accurate to my exact situation when I wrote this quiz. (The silly goose came back and stole my whiskey.)
“Going on a wild goose chase”
A: Also an old timey expression, and also what I was literally doing at that moment.
“What do you mean under arrest you should arrest that goose he’s a goddamn thief get your hands off me I’m not drunk am not am not am not fine but tell that fucking goose he hasn’t seen the last of me”
A: Neither, sorry, that was my phone’s talk-to-text again.
“Poop! Shit! Fuck!”
A: 5-year-old. Tyler’s always been overzealous with the “poop” exclamations, and he just learned to curse. Whenever I let my guard down for too long, he shrieks “Poop! Shit! Fuck!” directly into my ear.
Also, on my way out of the park I stepped in goose poop.
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