If someone uses different words to avoid the use of profanity, is it still improper? As a child, I often wondered who this Sam Hill character was and why my father was so concerned about what he was up to.
Growing up in the south, I heard such sayings on a daily basis, and quite frankly, didn’t realize that to much of the world, they seemed unusual. I’ve worked in five states – Arkansas, Oklahoma, Texas, Georgia and Alabama – and have picked up some local saying at each stop, but it has taken me a half a century to realize that someone in Atlanta may not have a clue what someone in Oklahoma City is talking about, and vice versa.
I used to have a baseball coach that would yell out after fouling off a two-strike pitch, “You live to see another day.” Well, I’d prefer to see much more than just “another” day, but I’ll take Saturday if I must choose. Also along the way, I’ve heard the expression “Living to eat another day.” I’ve found that Wednesdays taste the best.
One of my brothers once told me a story about an old man that walked in off the streets regularly into a break room while everyone was sipping their morning coffee. No one knew him, but he was allowed to have a cup. The man would always grab a cup, sit down, and announce to his uninterested audience, “It’s colder than a well digger’s butt.” My brother confused the man one morning by asking, “In degrees, what number reaches the coldness of a well digger’s butt?”
Speaking of temperatures and derrieres, I’ve heard more than once lately that it’s been “hotter than a goat’s butt in a pepper patch.”
Unhappy about something? “You can get glad the same way you got mad.”
Really mad? “Knock ‘em into the middle of next week looking both ways for Sunday.”
Really happy about things? “I feel like a rat in a cheese factory with the cat on vacation.”
Been busy this summer? “He’s busier than a one-legged man in a butt-kicking contest.” (I promise that’s my last derriere reference.)
Ready for kids to go back to school? “They’re as wild as junebugs on a string.”
Know that someone who just doesn’t get it? “He’s only got one oar in the water.”
Passing judging on someone you don’t know very well? “Don’t judge them until you walk a mile in their shoes.” Well, for starters, I have no desire to walk in someone else’s shoes and haven’t had much desire to walk a mile anywhere in this heat, because, you know, it‘s been hotter than… oh you know.
Got a girlfriend really high on herself? “She’s so stuck up she’d drown in a rainstorm.”
Hanging out with the wrong crowd? “You lie down with dogs and you’ll get up with fleas.” Or, “You hoot with the owls at night and you can’t soar with the eagles in the day.”
Speaking of dogs, why do we use them as an example when someone is unable to do something? “That dog won’t hunt.”
More animal references: “He’s as nervous as a long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs.” Or, “It stunk so bad it would knock a buzzard off a gut wagon.” Or, “If you can spot one rat, there’s probably 50 you can’t.”
A coach talking about one of his out-of-shape players: “If he was an inch taller he’d be round.”
My father, right before referring to Sam Hill as I tried to explain that I could not do something: “Can’t never could.”
Finally, have you got that one person that you just don’t want to hear from some days? “My cow died last night so I don’t need your bull.”