Re: Willy nilly

On Thu, Nov 06, 2003 at 08:22:31PM +0000, Lucy Pearson wrote:

> Willy nilly comes not from Latin, but from Anglo Saxon. I can't call
> to mind exactly how the original phrase worked, but it translates
> literally as 'whether he wishes to or not'.

One of our educational subscribers is having mail problems ("that
bastard sendmail is acting up") and asked me to pass along his
message on this, which is intended to end the discussion once and
for all, since the non-matriculated world has been bungling it to
the limit of our subscriber's patience:

        It's CLEAR, for anyone who takes the TIME to
        at least EXAMINE it, that this derives from a
        distinctly OVER-analyzed story from the boring
        postwar era, called "Uncle Willy-Nilly in
        Connecticut," for God's sake. You can find the
        reference yourself, I mean. Umm, do you know
        where I can at least place an ORDER for some
        goddamn snAILS? With GARLIC and BUTter, I
        mean, if that's not ASKing too much?

        --Lane Coutell (le_mot_juste@testicular.edu)

<OK, so here's where I duck, quickly>

--tim

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Received on Thu Nov 6 17:36:47 2003