Conference thebay::joyoflex

They do not mean the same.  "Worth shit" means somebody will give you
shit for it.  "Ain't worth shit" means they won't give you shit for it.

As far as I am concerned, not getting shit for something is preferable --
which makes it worth more.

- chuck

	       Slow up
       
 	       Slow down
       
       --Don

The classic such pair is flammable / inflammable.

				David Larrick

What's going on?

What's coming off?

				Jack Wickwire

Yeah, yeah, yeah...

Pat Sweeney

This must be the place to mention those colloquialisms that capture the ear of
newcomers to the Boston area: 

	"So don't I." - meaning "I do it that way, too." 
			or "I feel the same way about it." 

	"I could care less." - meaning "I don't care at all." 
                                                          
Joe

	"Do you mind if I turn this radio down just a little ?"

	"Sure, no problem, go right ahead !"

/Eric

To paraphrase George Carlan:

	o I don't give a shit
	
	o Well, I don't take no shit
   
(like its worth something)

-Shit for brains-

This was an actual conversation between two of us (group clowns) after an
unproductive spell several months back: 


"Boy, I got diddly done today."

"Not me...I didn't do diddly all week."


John.

  regardless
irregardless

R.

    re: .10
    
    Check your dictionary.  Unless it has been admitted in the past
    five years, "irregardless" is not a word.

    Re .11:
    
    > Check your dictionary.  Unless it has been admitted in the past five
    > years, "irregardless" is not a word. 
    
    4.18-4.20.
    
    
    				-- edp

    As long as the topic has been raised again, it was interesting to
    note how it is handled in the DEC-issued American Heritage Dictionary:
    
    "ir.re.gard.less  adv. *Nonstandard*. Regardless
    
     Usage: *Irregardless*, a double negative, is only acceptable when
    the intent is clearly humorous."
    
    In other words, if you're not being facetious, it aint funny!    
   

    There's a restaurant called "Irregardless" in Raleigh, NC.  Highly
    recommended, btw.  The menu admits that it's not a valid word, but
    says the owner didn't do too well in English classes when he was
    in college, and if he did, he might not be a cook today.

    The house burned up.
    The house burned down.

    Maybe someone can explain why it is quite common for people to say
    that something is `cheap at half the price' when they mean that
    it is good value.  It only makes sense to me if you take cheap to
    mean shoddy in which case the phrase implies that the article would
    still be poor value at half the price - quite the opposite meaning
    to its common usage.

>    Maybe someone can explain why it is quite common for people to say
>    that something is `cheap at half the price' when they mean that
>    it is good value.  

I dont' claim to have the definitive answer, but I never heard the 
expression being used that way until the musical "Oliver!" opened.  
The song "Who Will Buy?" had the following:

	"Where is the man with all the money?
	 It's cheap at half the price!"

From that time, people of my aquaintance (and me, for that matter)
picked up the phrase as a "cute-ism" and have used it to mockingly refer
to a good deal. 
					>>>==>PStJTT

    re .16 ("cheap at half the price")
    
    I had the impression that there was once an expression like
    "a bargain at twice the price", thus the humor in a fast-talking
    swindler saying "cheap at half the price". 
                                                   
                  /
                 (  ___
                  ) ///
                 /
    

    	I am not sure when "Oliver" came out, but I expect my grandmother's
    set of stock phrases was fairly static since the 1930's.
    
    	"Cheap" in English just means "not expensive", and therefore
    is a positive descriptive term rather than the negative meaning
    it seems to have in American. "Cheap at half the price" is just
    the traditional English understatement like "She could get me in
    to bed with her, if she really tried" as an expression for someone
    one finds attractive.

What's up?
What's going down?

   ...  meaning that two objects (airplanes these days) came close
   to colliding, but did not.
    
    Clay

    Ben has a lead foot. Bob should get the lead out.
              ---------                     --------
         [drives too fast]             [moves too slowly]
                                       
    

    And, of course,
    
      ravel/unravel.
    

    When your alarm clock wakes you in the morning, you might refer to it as:
    "My alarm went off at 7:00."
    hmmm...

        Trying-to-sleep spouse:  "Turn off that alarm!"
        Me:  "It already went off!"

    When there's a power failure, lights can be referred to as having gone out.
    When did they go in?

    Then there are the words check (or cheque, for those of you east
    of the pond) and bill.
    
    We usually pay our bills with checks.
    
    But in restaurants, we can pay our checks with dollar bills.
    
    (Yes, I know that once dollar bills were bills "payable in lawful
    money," but how did restaurant bills come to be called checks?)
    
    

    	To further confuse things, on this side of the Atlantic dollar
    bills are "notes", while in some parts of France "notes" are the
    restaurant receipts, which are not the same as restaurant bills.

    Re .26
    
    Restaurant bills = checks (in the USofA)
    
    Does the 'check' not refer to proof of ownership , as in a hat check.
    If you've eaten a meal , the bill or whatever is proof of this for
    things such as your Tax Returns , expenses etc .
    
    I am not from the US , so I'm guessing .
    
    John J
    

    Maybe this quotation from a newsletter seems to belong in a note with
    the title `apparent similars' rather than _opposites_:

	 
    �     The refurbishment of the bar and other areas at Queens House is 
    �     still on-going, but it is hoped that work will commence on this very 
    �     shortly! 
    
    I seldom expect much sense from an utterance that includes the word
    `ongoing' [NB I said `seldom', not `never'], but this is the first
    time I've seen it used with so clear an implication of inactivity.
    
    b    
    

    I've been calling these things "contranyms".
    
    My favorite, not invented by me:
    
    	maternity dress v. paternity suit
    
    I'll add more as they come back to me.
    
    P.S. Flammable v. inflammable is OK, but that "in-" is the intensifier
    "in-". Trouble was, people kept thrusting flaming torches into buckets
    of gasoline labelled "inflammable", so John D. Rockefeller invented
    the word "flammable" to stop them.
    

    NY bank had an ad:
    
    Free Gift (for anyone opening a new account...)
    
    What is a free gift???
    

    A free gift is an oxymoron. (q.v.)
    
    					andrew

    This is the first one I came up with:
    
    "bag man" v. "bag lady".
 
    Here are some others, not all of them mine:
 
    "fathering" v. "mothering"
 
    "opener" v. "shutter"
 
    "listener" v. "speaker"
 
    "planetary" v. "solitary" (as in Sol, the sun)
 
    "plating" v. "bowling"
 
    "coupled" v. "singled"
 
    "doublet" v. "triplet"
 
    "kidder" v. "adulterer"
 
    And, to repeat my favorite:
 
    "maternity dress" v. "paternity suit"
 
    My interest in this goes back to an old army cartoon in which the
    generals go through the door marked "Private" and the privates go
    through the door marked "General".

re: .32

>    A free gift is an oxymoron. (q.v.)
    
Interesting.  It seems more like a redundancy to me.  If this discussion has 
happened before, point me to it.

Clay

>>    A free gift is an oxymoron. (q.v.)
    
> Interesting.  It seems more like a redundancy to me.  If this discussion has 
> happened before, point me to it.

I agree.  If you want oxymorons how about "free spending" or "expensive
gift?"  A common oxymoronic phrase is Time/Life's "free with your paid
subscription." 

					>>>==>PStJTT 

    I received a letter in the mail yesterday offering me an "ABSOLUTELY
    FREE GIFT".  Yes, just like that in screaming upper-case.
    
    After calling the number to find how to "IMMEDIATELY CLAIM YOUR
    FREE GIFT", I found out that I had to first buy something!

    ary vs. nary
    
    "Nary a one . . ."
    
    "Ary a one . . ."
    

    File card (3X5 card) 
    vs. 
    card file (metal "curry-comb" for getting 
    little bits of metal out of the teeth of a file)

>   File card (3X5 card) 
>   vs. 
>   card file (metal "curry-comb" for getting 
>   little bits of metal out of the teeth of a file)

        I thought they were both called the same; file card. One a card
        you file (away). The other a wire toothed brush to card or
        clean a file. The same tool used to card wool.

        A card file is a box.

        	Mike

    First mistake I ever made!
    

        I used my nit card for that one.

        	Mike

    Sometime within the next twelve hours, the 1988 American presidential
    election will finally come to a close when one of the candidates
    concedes victory to the other one.  That is, when one of the candidates
    concedes defeat to the other one.
    
Lew Lasher

    Concedes victory or accepts defeat.

    re: .41

    Is a nit card anything like a union card?
    
    --bonnie

>    Is a nit card anything like a union card?
    
Is that nit wit?

>        <<< Note 108.45 by PSTJTT::TABER "Digital Proprietary Waste" >>>
>
>>    Is a nit card anything like a union card?
>    
>Is that nit wit?

        I didn't say that.

        A nit car allows you to get the finest strands from a pile of
        nit so that your story can be fabricated out of whole cloth...
        or is that hole cloth?

                Mike

    I don't think you'd want to card a union suit out of this hole
    cloth of yours, however.
    
    --bonnie

    "What's a 'hole card'?", he said, poker faced.

    Are apparent synonyms allowed too?
    
    Priceless vs. worthless

    Slim chance == fat chance
    
    Slow up == slow down
    
    Reverse discrimination == discrimination
    
    Defensive == offensive

                             Nice Girl/Good Girl

I wasn't sure whether this topic or 107 was a better match, but
it struck me today while dozing off in a meeting that "macro"
and "high level" are synonymous in management jargon but
antonymic in programming jargon.

Ray

.53>	                                                  ... "macro"
.53>	and "high level" are synonymous in management jargon but
.53>	antonymic in programming jargon.

Not really.  Macros allow you to program in a higher level than if you were
not to use them.  A macro assembler allows you to program in a higher level
than a plain assembler.  I've also worked with high-level languages that
had a macro facility, allowing the programmer to define constructs not provided
by the compiler.

"Macro" sometimes is used (especially within Digital) to refer generically
to assembly code.  This is incorrect, strictly speaking, as an assembler
may or may not have a macro facility.

    RE.16
    
               My favorite rendering of this phrase is that "its cheap at
    twice the price." and is also ment to be humorous.
    
    
                                        Mark
    
     

    re -1:  But that's the "correct" rendering of the phrase -- 
    
    Something that is such a good value, it would still be a bargain
    even if its price were doubled...
    
    					andrew

    Exactly...a symptom of the times.  
   
    I will point out another misused phrase (referenced early on in this
    topic, and not refuted)...
    
    			"I could care less."
    
    instead of "couldn't".  Interestingly, it is very parallel in sense to the 
    phrase in .55, et al.
    
    Cheers...Gary

Can't recall if I've mentioned this before...

In the part of Kentucky where my parents live, the phrase "I don't care to"
means "I'd be glad to." 

Example from my last visit:

Me:		Excuse me, could you bring a glass of water?
Waitperson:	I don't care to.
Me:		?

    re -.1:  Your mention of Kentucky struck the "opposite" chord, and
             I recalled an event from my military days which certainly
             fills the bill.
    
             However, it is a bit off-color, you might say, so I'm putting
             it after an <FF>:
    
    This ensures *everyone* will read it, a???  What a gimmick.
    
    If your still game, press on.
    
    While I was in Germany a good ol' boy from the South (can't recall
    the state) joined our outfit.  We got to playing pool in the Day
    Room now & then, and one evening he asked me if I'd like to go
    downtown with him and "get some cock".  I respectfully declined,
    thinking it best he go by himself.
    The next time he saw me he explained what he meant; seems I wasn't
    the only one to turn him down.  As you've guessed, he meant pu--
    ahhh, just the opposite; that's just what they called it back home.
    Being in an inquisitive mood, I asked him (in simpler words) how 
    such an odd slang expression evolved.  He didn't know!!!
    
    					Don (whose military experience 
                                            has helped him in all *kinds* 
                                            of unexpected ways)

    The most probable derivation is that in that sense it's a short
    form of "cockle," a very old slang term for, er, the, um, external
    lips of the, um, item in question.
    
    A "cockle" in usage that doesn't need to be put behind a form feed
    refers to a sort of heart-shaped bivalve that has a sharp division
    between two rounded halves.  It also refers to the dark tassel of
    stuff like hair at the top of an ear of corn and other grains.  
    
    The presumed derivation is from the visual similarities. 
    
    --bonnie

    Just noticed Bonnie says (writes) "um" while I used "uh", and I
    realized this is not the first time I've seen this distinction.
    I just might start a new topic & see if it's been discussed before.
    
    							Don

re .60

The drill sergeants in my basic training company used the same, er, uh,
idiom.

re .62.

I use "er, uh."

Dave C.

From an interview with an athlete I heard on the radio this morning:

	"We've had a tough season, but we haven't let up
	 and we haven't let down."

Clay