As my granny used to say.....

there's another name for it? seems not, else you would have called it that instead of "area at the top of the stairs", right? i never heard anyone call it anything other than landing. every generation of my family says landing. am i missing out on something? OH NOES.

xp yeah, wierd.

4. An upright case or closet for the safe keeping of
articles; as, a clothes press. --Shak.
[1913 Webster]

"It rolls like a square ball."

What I find weird is how things travel, I used to live in Ayrshire, and found it really funny when an old neighbour referred to a clothes horse as a winterdyke. My mum had never heard it called that before and we thought it was just an Ayrshire thing. Afew years ago we visited friends in Berwick upon Tweed, and they called it a winterdyke too.

One or two of the folk in my work have heard of it, others who were born and brought up in the same area haven't.

ask these lunatics what they refer to it as. then shoot them.

Joyce uses "press" in a portrait of the artist when he's describing the cupboard the holy wine is kept in.

And she called the dining room the 'middle kitchen'.

Obv don't shoot'em in the head cause there's nothing vital there.

Expressions have been as rare as teeth in a chicken here.

that's awesome!

"Cooch"????

My step-dad always says 'it takes a man not a shirt button' whenever anyone mock-threatens him.

Sorry i just realised i didnt phrase this very well . Shes a british granny and instead of saying twenty five past five, would say five and twenty past five

I say jiffy

Touche.

it will very much affect a headline in next week's her4ld magazine.

Ni99er, p@ki, etc etc... Not that I actually use them myself, obviously, but I suspect eyebrows would be raised if I did...

Here's another: es't = 'That is'. ie. es't proper reet, lad = 'That is very good, young man'.

cob on = a sulky manner

"I'm so hungry, I could eat a horse between two bread vans."

...although, most of them are just "standard" Irish/Lancashire turns of phrase that sound CRAZY and out of place in Minnesota.

I love all the Caithness/Doric ones that my mum comes out with which I have no idea how to spell. FOr example, the word for a dog is a bowf (maybe bouf, I'm not sure) but our dog Sandy was always referred to as "the bowf", "bowfy" or "Sandy-bowf". This is not weird to people in the North of Scotland, but elsewhere can cause much hilarity. My mum also has a fab word for feeling a bit weak and queasy, which is pronounced fee-oun (rhyming with noun) which I use a lot and have never heard anyone else say.

A piece of jam - a jam sandwich.

See, up here that's a piece AND jam. Unless you are Oor Wullie, in which case it's a jeely piece.

Er, my Gran used to call teeth 'rackles'. "Rub yer rackles or the English'll get yeh", she used to say.

True story.

bowg = stomach (that's a Caithness one, definitely)
keeker = black eye
bauchle = a scabby old shoe (or a skanky person by extension)
away in a dwam = daydreaming (OK, I have heard that off other people, but not that many)

I can't even think of things that might be odd because I just use words I grew up listening to and it never occurred to me that they might be odd. I only found out a couple of weeks ago that scaffy wasn't in common usage down here (focus group = three blokes in the pub).

Xpost = Fit as a butcher's dog, innit?

Face as long as a wet weekend.

xp: my mom says "fat."

"Crotchety" - someone who's angry and upset: "Don't get crotchety". I've never heard this used since, but it's pretty great!

Really? I've heard this all over the States, but usually only in conjunction with phrases like "crotchety old man."

Gadgie/gadgiecoff = a bloke
Burach/guddle/midden = a great big untidy mess (much like my house at the moment)

The best insult I ever heard my dad shout at the football was to any useless striker who couldn't direct a header = "he's got a head like a Tobermory Tattie". (it's a sweetie).

ailsa: i think yr etymology might yet be proved correct. either way: thank you all who responded.

i've seen this at the bookstore and one day i'm going to sit down in the starbucks and read it:

http://images.amazon.com/images/P/0312307411.01._BO2,204,203,200_PIlitb-dp-500-arrow,TopRight,32,-59_AA240_SH20_SCLZZZZZZZ_.jpg

Gutties - trainers

"I've got a mouth shaped for ______________" used by my gran - ie: "I had a mouth shaped for a mutton pie and they had none left."

Or "I took a notion for a mutton pie"

Classic insult in the teenage race to lose one's virginity: "You still think a stonner's for pishing over high walls!"
The worst thing imaginable at school was to be the boy who "got a stonner in the showers"

Another horrible word for "courting" here in the west of Scotland is "winching". I've actually heard someone say "Not in the face, I'm winching" before a street fight.

little bosthoons! my mum used to call people "bastidges and iceholes", but i've no idea where she got that from.

Dirty-lookin' eejit
Dirty-lookin' up all night (note that this in no way implies that you have been up all night. It is not the same as being a dirty stop-out)

Grimly, I've an idea your mam got that from a Mel Brooks film, or something similar.

My mate's granny always called him a "big algae" - I think it started as a reference him growing too quickly but ended up as a general insult.

My Nan used to refer to amusing people as "a card" or "a star turn".

I always thought "cloot" was a word for "coat" ("ne'er cast a cloot 'til May's oot").

... this one used to really confuse me. "Knock" pronounced to rhyme with "cloak" of course.

puddock - a toad
speug - a sparrow

x-post: god, yes, i've not heard that in years.

i should have a much better collection of this stuff because my dad's from the frozen north-east of scotland, and my mum's from the frozen north-east of scotland BY WAY OF BRADFORD. which is kinda fucked-up in terms of accent/dialect/regional lexicon.

clipe: tell-tale, school supergrass type

(we've had some fascinating discussions over the years, me and my dad.)

stank - a drain or drain cover

yes. my old granny kept a special cloth for this very purpose.

a good clootie dumpling is a thing of joy.

mrs fiendish, who hails from arran, calls spring onions sibies. or maybe sybies. or some other spelling that i'm just not getting.

puggled - knackered, bushed, tired

... not sure of the spelling of that one

lots of these are universal, i think, like lobby, jiffy etc. isn't a hall something you only get on the ground floor, then the landing is what you get on the other floors?

I'm not quite sure how to spell this phonetically, but my grandmother used to call the cupboard under the stairs the "kutch" (
to rhyme with 'butch')

-- C J (CJ_The_Unrul...), November 28th, 2005 1:24 PM. (later)

i wonder if that's a variation on "hutch." (xxpost)

-- athol fugard (theundergroundhom...), November 28th, 2005 1:28 PM. (later)

iirc this is a welsh thing... i can't figure out how to spell it (cwtsi? doesn't look right!) ("si" makes a "sh" or "zh" sound) but as well as cupboard-under-stairs - or any little hidey-hole really - it means a quick cuddle, a little hug. i only remember because someone told me about people being beaten at school for using the word when the english were trying to suppress the welsh (haha, "were").

A piece of jam - a jam sandwich.

-- Anna (Fieldingann...), November 28th, 2005 2:32 PM. (later)

haha anna this is BRILLIANT! i am going to use it all the time.

My grandmother always said, "Be oblong and have your knees removed."

-- Paunchy Stratego (fluxion2...), November 29th, 2005 4:09 AM. (later)

wtf does this mean? it sounds great.

Once, when my brother forgot his Maths book, the Christian Brother who taught him said "oh, it's at home is it? You might as well put it in a glass case and throw sugar at it".

-- accentmonkey (tris...), November 29th, 2005 8:16 AM. (later)

this one is awesome too.

Moroculous (sp?) - steaming drunk

Ginger - fizzy juice (pop?)

I always imagined this is just "miraculous" as in "It's miraculous that he's still standing"

We say this too. You don't run errands here, you go out for a message. And groceries are messages.

Is 'beastie' universal for insect?

Peely Wally = probably my favourite Scots phrase ever

"Ya dirty bissum ye've skittered yer breeks"

Oos - fluff

it's never occurred to me that this is anything other than the queen's proper english.

I always imagined this is just "miraculous" as in "It's miraculous that he's still standing"

er, yes. me too. and my pocket scots dictionary agrees.

getting "messages" and also a "carry-oot" caused me no end of grief when i came to scotland; the former i just didn't understand, and the latter i assumed involved food, not liquid.

mädchen: my scots dictionary doesn't have stobies or stogies. you don't make stovies from slaters, do you? :)

Baffies anyone?

Oh, I love that one too

baldie a haircut "thats some baldie you've got by the way"
juke the inside of your coat/jacket etc. "quick stick it up yer juke!"
shatter someone who has no guts i.e. they shit themselves at the smallest sign of danger
burr dingy i don't believe you

chib - a weapon of indefinable nature (plus can be used as a verb too)

they also use kets for sweets. eg: "howay man, gonna giz yer kets before ah hoof ye in the knackaz?"

(apologies to viz)

RUNNY

is a great word.

When translated to, say, Harald Brattbakk or some other diddy footballer in Scotland, this becomes "he couldnae hit a coo's erse wi' a banjo" which is much more evocative.

Re: Peely-wally, when they announced a concert in memory of John Peel, the Daily Record ran with the headline "Peely Rally", which had me roffling. Or pishing ma keks, if you prefer.

Ooh, just remembered another cracker - ganting which is like desperate/gasping for something "Ah wis pure ganting for a pint/shag/deep fried Mars Bar" etc.

My dad also used to refer to the nastier variety of lucky gits as "snottery orphan"s - generally directed at sporting people who were undeniably good but very dull, therefore worthy of ridicule anyway (top recipient of this insult would have been Steve Davis). I think it showed a grudging respect rather than being an insult. I haven't heard him say it for years, so I think he may have invented it to stop himself swearing in front of his impressionable young childrem.

stet's dad could presumably also fall in a bucket of shit and come up smelling of roses, especially in (the north-west of?) england.

where do people (scots esp) stand on the drop scone/pancake debate? my mum used to make drop scones and call them pancakes, which confused me no end (and led to severe public humiliation from a teacher one sad shrove tuesday).

My grandparents say this as does my mother.

we should rectify this with some kind of GLASGOW PANCAKE FAP. or something.

It's smaller and thicker! My gran would be spinning in her grave if she heard people confusing the two.

And are those big flat ones with the dimples in them crumpets to you?

Did anybodies parents ever talk about having a 'piece on sugar?' Christ, no wonder our oral health is so bad.

My mum still say's 'woe betide you' and 'hell skud it intae ye' as well as 'I'll take my hand off your face' (see Billy Connolly).

I've got one of those magnet sets with all old Glasgow words - but I don't know what some of them mean. I'll check when I get home tonight and you can all translate them for me...

At the moment they spell out the wondrous phrase that is "ya torn faced bowfin ginger specky bampot" (Refers to the bastard ex, I keep it as a reminder)

Stooshie, Rammie, Tumshie...anyone?

Has anyone heard Tumshie Smiley,the news reader on Virgin? It cracks me up everytime I hear her name!

Great thread Rumpie!

I have The Complete Patter by Michael Munro - an essential read for anyone with an interest.

bring them on!

Some bizarre and wrong entries but some classics as well.

and then yer arse fell aff: A term used when someone is bullshitting

Don't know what happened to that the first time I tried to post it.

They sound more like Springburn schemies to me, Greenock's a bit more singy-songy-westy with added nasal.

The Dolmio things are done by a bloke in Greenock, and also reference the old bloke going to Greenock during the war. So it's probably not Greenock. It's probably *gulp* Paisley!

To get off Scottish things for a second, do other people's parents still use "the sights you see when you don't have a gun" when seeing any goths/punks/people of questionable conformity?

xpost - Queerhawk - is that a Scots thing or is it just coz my mum is the only person I know that uses it?

Bahookie - bum
Black-affronted - embarassed
Merrit - married
Swally - alcohol
Geggie - mouth
Bowfin - gross, mingin etc
Rummle - sort of stir..(now THAT reminds me of my Granny at the bingo rummle them up son, rummel them up)
Oh and its' "miraculous' according to this lot
Puggy - fruit machine
lavvy - toilet
hughie -to vomit
Boke - retch

Clarty - now we used to say clatty, meaning minging or gorss, but Clarty, anyone?

Dauner?

The babes?

loosie?

ovies?

keelie?

Boggin

Slag - as in to take the mick, not the nasty word fur a wummin

Humph

What does bauchle mean?

Stoatin

Hoachin

Corrie-fisted

skelly eyes

Hmm, what's a 'wally close'?

Right I'm going skelly eyed noo...I'm putting it away...

I still use the Taggart-inspired dunderheid, but mostly for comedic effect (see also "there's bin a murrrrderrrr").

I'm trying to introduce some classic "Chewing the Fat" phrases into everyday usage. Best one last series = Winston's wake-up call to his lazy grandson "haw, you, oot yer wanking chariot"

Those Dolmio ads started a craze in our office a few months ago of going "fucking yaldy" whenever anyone got a text message. I'm glad someone else was sad enough to request on that bloke's blog that he should make it commercially available for use on phones :)

(xpost - a wally close is one of the Glasgow tenements with ceramic tiling in it)

(wally dugs = http://auction.goanm.co.uk/CatalogueFiles/TSAborder/AuctionItemImages/wally/1.jpg)

As I posted upthread, it's a (usually scuffed) shoe

"where's don C this week? holidays?"
"aye. he's spending the week at home in the chariot. with a box of kleenex and a tub of cold cream."

has anyone mentioned havering yet? i surprised myself today by accusing someone of doing it.

My dad is possibly the only living Scottish person in the world who actually uses "och aye the noo". It seems to be the verbalisation of a yawn for him, but still, he uses it.

hmmm :)

Also, where I come from apparently "I'm knocked up" *used* to mean "I'm fackin exhausted". Can you imagine the hilarity ensuing, etc etc.

Puggled or peched out means knackered round these parts. Though again, I'm not sure if "pech" (which is basically a verb meaning to puff or wheeze or generally be short of breath) is a Highland thing, a Scottish thing or a my-parents thing.

We here in Ireland use this expression also. And we say 'grand' to mean, well, just about anything really.

keelie?

Okay, clarty is clatty, daunner is like saunter - a stroll. The babes or the wee babes for some reason means something good. "Those stovies were the babes." Loosie I don't know and ovies means overalls.

That's a walk isn't it?

'Ah'm goin a wee dauner doon the toon'

Ailsa, I think you're getting Chewin' The Fat and Still Game mixed up, though you reminded me of the Stoory Midouri
stoory: covered in dust

Scottish words illustrated: http://stooryduster.co.uk/index.htm

Well hell mend ye for displeasing yer maw

has anyone mentioned havering yet? i surprised myself today by accusing someone of doing it.

I accused myself of doing it upthread

Can't believe I missed ovies - how could I NOT know what ovies means?

Beamer, riddy & brass neck.

OMG, stoory! Oor Wullie and his pals used to go their kartie down the Stoory Brae, didn't they? (also, stoory midori = comedy gold)

No-one has mentioned yer maw yet, have they? (Architecture in Helsinki's tour van to thread!)

I'm going to get in trouble for this, but New Zealand, I think.

I call 'em swimmers.

to confuse matters further, i'm gonna drop a pikelet into the mix. pikelet = drop scone, yes?

also my mum (from cumbria) has always called a swimming costume a "cossie", and never set foot in nz/aus or had any relatives living there etc...

And beak for nose? Or neb?

Other things I've found myself saying today that I thought might fit in here: having a fly pint in the pub (as in a wee sneaky extra one that I won't admit to) - also various words that I don't think I have seen on this thread, glaikit (gormless - specifically used to describe Barry Ferguson this evening), wabbit (used to describe me after four nights of chronic insomnia), mawkit (used to describe about three-quarters of the Rangers team). Also ya fud = best childish insult ever, again aimed at Barry Ferguson (fud = fanny). Also fair scunnered\ = pissed off.

I'm a skyscraper wean; I live on the nineteenth flair;
But I'm no' gaun oot tae play ony mair,
'Cause since we moved tae Castlemilk, I'm wastin' away
'Cause I'm gettin' wan meal less every day.

Refrain:
Oh ye cannae fling pieces oot a twenty storey flat,
Seven hundred hungry weans'll testify, to that.
If it's butter, cheese or jeely, if the breid is plain or pan,
The odds against it reaching earth are ninety-nine tae wan.

On the first day ma maw flung oot a daud o' Hovis broon;
It came skytin' oot the windae and went up insteid o' doon.
Noo every twenty-seven hoors it comes back intae sight
'Cause ma piece went intae orbit and became a satellite.

On the second day ma maw flung me a piece oot wance again.
It went and hut the pilot in a fast low-flying plane.
He scraped it aff his goggles, shouting through the intercom,
'The Clydeside Reds huv giat me wi' a breid-an-jeely bomb'.

On the third day ma maw thought she would try another throw.
The Salvation Army band was staundin' doon below.
'Onward, Christian Soldiers' was the piece they should've played,
But the oompah man was playing a piece an' marmalade.

We're wrote away to Oxfam to try an' get some aid,
An' a' the weans in Castlemilk have formed a 'piece brigade'.
We're gonnae march to George's Square demanding civil rights
Like nae mair hooses over piece-flinging height

Which reminded me that skyting (which I would have spelt "skiting") is another excellent word. As I've said already, I use so many of these things in my everyday speech, I forget they aren't in common usage elsewhere.

(stripes of shit on your drawers)

Drawers meaning pants obviously...

I thought drouth was a thirst for a drink.

'Uh've an awfy drouth this mornin' ah'm goin' oot fur a wee curer'

i love this thread.

Drouth \Drouth\, n.
Same as Drought. --Sandys.

Another ill accident is drouth at the spindling of
corn. --Bacon.

One whose drouth [thirst], Yet scarce allayed, still
eyes the current stream. --Milton.

In the dust and drouth of London life. --Tennyson.

What about drawers? (normally pronounced 'drars')

a 'piece brigade'.

lol!

Dad, who grew up in a village in Northamptonshire, taught me his favourite childhood rhyme: "Ma's out, Pa's out, let's talk rude: pee po belly bum drawers!" Things that were rude in the early fifties, oh dear me.

My dear departed Granny used to tell me that I had 'Hauns like fireman's shovels'

Whenever he would hear the time being read out on the telly or radio, my Grandpa would repeat the time to himself by saying something like

'Three O'Clock and all's well, an Irishman drowned in the Clyde'

I've no idea where that came from (apart from being a bit racist of course) especially considering the not insubstantial irish blood in my family. I think it's a Paisley thing.

Baffies/Baffys are uber classic! My favourite ever expression.

'Yir ontae plums there!' - on a hiding to nothing, plums as in the lowest paid denominator of a fruit machine.

'Wur tea's oot!' - we are in trouble of some description, equivalent to leaving your XXXXX out in the wind I'm guessing.

'Staunin' up someone's arse' - being in their personal space, hurrying them up, etc.

Also ya fud = best childish insult ever

pish, ya dobber.

It's not racist, it's sectarian.

Aw, this is a steam train reference. My grandad was a fireman, before he became a driver.

Indeed, that was apparently a big problem in Paisley in days of yore, Proddy Irish fighting Fenian Irish and vice versa

Brass neck?

mate (sheepishly explaining some faux pas): "but I thought..."
granny "Thought?! You know what thought done? Thought ran efter a bin motor an' thought it wis a weddin'!"

A riddie perhaps?

Best I ever heard was a ned reffering to his nose as his Mozam - as in Mozambique....geddit?

Which meaning do you use?

Also to 'chin' someone in relation to giving them a hard time verbally.

Or, if you're behind on your chores, it's "three o'clock and not a child in the house washed!"

Janey Mack is a great Dublin expression too. As in "Janey Mack, me shirt is black, what'll I do for Sunday".

Usually there was one poor feller in the class whose family were dirt poor so he would have to wear them in the classroom too, instead of the requisite Adidas mambo or whatever.

This poor soul would then be forever labeled 'bugsy', as in 'yir family's aw bugsy, away an' wash!'

Mind you I'm not entirely sure if this is still as prevalent, my mum and dad don't use it much.

Has anyone got any good french derived old scots expressions beyond 'ashet' (which is the only one that springs to mind)

My Gran could spout for hours about the origins of loads of French derived Scots words, it's always been to my lasting regret that I never taped her.

From: http://scotsyett.com/whitscots1.htm - scroll down for the English version.

Anither leid at hes gien a fouthie handsel tae the Scots is French. Aabody at kens onythin o the historie o Scotland kens about the Auld Alliance, an thare nae dout at the lang freinship atweesh the twa kingriks eikit muckle tae the Scots leid; but mony a French wird cam intae Scots, an English forbye, lang afore the Alliance. Een the wee tait o French at maist o's lernit at the scuil shaws us whaur words lik ashet, aumrie, tassie, dour, douce, disjune or fash cam frae. Rabbie Burns's collie Luath hed a Gaelic name, but his face wes bawsant: a French wird. Thare coudna be a brawer or prouder Scottish ceity nor Aiberdeen, but it hes a French motto, Bon-Accord. Our best-loe'd festival o the year, Hogmanay, hes a French name, houbeit a Frenchman o our ain days micht be haurd pit til't tae cognose the auld French word aguillaneuf in its Scots descendant. An we aa ken whit a body micht hear in the gaits an wynds o Embra no sae langsyne, wairnin thaim tae jouk out the wey o kenna-whit flung out a windae: gardyloo, frae garde à l'eau

Poor soul pronounced to rhyme with "towel" of course

I'd have said totey...as in tote bag...

hmm: only in the same metaphorical sense as "i'm going to kick his arse" or whatever. chinning is chinning: ie a punch in the face. "ah'm gonna fuckin' chin yee," etc.

re: what thought did. my dad, IIRC, used to come out with: "thought his feet were sticking out the bed, so got out to put them back in".

hmm. i must chin him about that.

"He was in that film... big guy... ah cannae mind whit ye cry him."

the first time he did it, i dropped the handset and ran.

(haundit = handed)

Grimly, it's truly another dimension up there, I'm sure scholars could unpick the N.Eastern vocab for years and years.

My uncle came out with this one, in Paisley a 'mud' is a fish supper, but only in a sloppy, coming back from the pub half pissed fingers stinking of grease and vinegar, half of it down yer front context.

Ergo a 'mud' sheer poetry!

What about the use of shop for a pub? As in:

Rangers fan #1: "D'ye fancy a drink?"
Rangers fan #2: "Aye"
Rangers fan #1: "Whit aboot this pub here?"
Rangers fan #2: "Naw, don't be daft, that's a Celtic shop!"

Anyone ever read Luke Sutherland's 'Jelly Roll?'

my dad's from up that way, and the remaining bits of his family are still there; my mum grew up there; one of my best friends is from turriff; and i went out with a girl from [1] keith for two years. yet there's still the odd moment when i can't understand a fucking word the crazy fuckers are saying.

last time i was up that way i found myself in a wee living room with my mum, my dad, my aunt, my uncle and my uncle's bidie-in. i was the tallest there by at least half a head. those who know me IRL will appreciate just how implausible such a situation could be.

[1] or was it "called"?

"nesh" or "naish" = weedy, feels the cold when it isn't cold, like a soft southerner (ie me or my dad)

"very feeding" - "very tiresome"

"in a paddy" = "in a temper"

shropshire:
"i doubt that so-and-so" = "i believe that so-and-so"

snigs = small wriggly things in tapwater when the reservoir gets infested

when we pointed her towards conventional usage, she said her version made more sense and ours made none, and just carried on

my other gran (the one who WASN'T scottish) had two of these AND a china statue of william wallace, which made me wonder if
i. this trio wz common (they seemed to be part of a set) (in memory i mean -- it's 30 years since i last saw them)
ii. in which case "wally" = transferred epiphet THUS: william wallace and his dogs (in china) = wally's dogs (in china) = china wally's dogs = wally dogs

or maybe my gran = only person ever to have these three items together on a shelf

She also gambles a lot and gets angry at the slot machines when she loses, often striking them with her fist and saying "Damn you machine! Damn you!"

Ooh, Hogmanany is also fast approaching, full of great old traditions - first footing with lumps of coal,uttering preposterous phrases like "lang may yer lum reek", that sort of thing.

STAPPED. As in "He had it stapped in so tight I could barely get it out"

Anyone???

(Not strapped, stapped!)

Heart this thread, revive because the phrase 'yer arse in parsley' just popped into my head.

My mother was ill before Xmas and she tells me that ever since she's "been feelin' like a hauf-shut knife".

a face like a well-skelped arse

these are still well in use, well they were when I last resided in the dear green place :(

my grandfather had a strange catalogue of well-worn phrases that tbh ive never heard anyone say so either very archaic and just a bit pish patter so didn't endure (quite likely) or just some idiosyncratic phrases he liked to hit out wi':

half the lies are never true
when youre right rich you can shop in Buchanan street
tony galenti (rhyming slang for plenty)
toffs are careless
that was rotten (invariably said immediately after finishing a particularly good meal)

My sister has just mentioned this one, I don't remember it but then I'm the wrong gender:

Granny Grey Hips - someone behaving older than they are.

Squeegee (sp?) - crooked, awry

e.g., "Ye'll huv tae hing that paintin' up again, it's aw' squeegee".

Also, I noticed when I was up last week, when my mum was trying to get an electrician and I had to talk to them on the phone because she's pretty corned beef these days, that people in Scotland still pronounce the letter J as jy.

My Dad used to tell my sister and I to 'stop your greeting' if we were moaning and/or crying. I think this is a Scots thing.

Was probably fed up with having to deal with pair o' greetin'-faced weans.

my mum and her family and my grandma had a bunch of weird phrases.

"cat's malak" to mean like a horrible mix of something, like eg if you put too much ketchup on your dinner. i thought this was common irish slang but friends don't seem to verify that.

"dol-di-dee" to mean rubbish or something that isn't true. feel like this is more common, in ireland, but dunno.

my dad's main thing he used to say was "DICK MACKESSY WOULDN'T DO THAT" in outraged anger if you did something stupid. when asked about dick mackessy he'd just explain he was like the village fool - "the mackessys were all eejits" but with no real deeper detail than that. i like to imagine dick turning in his grave.

I'm not quite sure how to spell this phonetically, but my grandmother used to call the cupboard under the stairs the "kutch" (
to rhyme with 'butch')

-- C J (CJ_The_Unrul...), November 28th, 2005 1:24 PM. (later)

i wonder if that's a variation on "hutch." (xxpost)

-- athol fugard (theundergroundhom...), November 28th, 2005 1:28 PM. (later)

iirc this is a welsh thing... i can't figure out how to spell it (cwtsi? doesn't look right!) ("si" makes a "sh" or "zh" sound) but as well as cupboard-under-stairs - or any little hidey-hole really - it means a quick cuddle, a little hug. i only remember because someone told me about people being beaten at school for using the word when the english were trying to suppress the welsh (haha, "were").

― emsk ( emsk), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 12:43 (10 years ago)

10 years later, and living on the English/Welsh border, I can confirm emsk is correct only it's spelled cwtch. Most people seem to use it in the sense of when they're under the weather and just want to lie on the sofa in a blanket. "I'm all cwtched up."

Also:

http://media.alesbymail.co.uk/catalog/product/cache/1/image/9df78eab33525d08d6e5fb8d27136e95/t/i/tiny-rebel---cwtch_2.jpg

I'm not quite sure how to spell this phonetically, but my grandmother used to call the cupboard under the stairs the "kutch" (
to rhyme with 'butch')
"Cooch"????

― Dan (Where You Stick The Cucumbers) Perry (Dan Perry), Monday, 28 November 2005 17:14 (10 years ago)

DJP should totally come over here and drink some cooch with me.

footery wee hings

"You'll have to use Shanks's pony."

'He dies in this"

Be back in a minute, just got to ben the other room.

oops

Be back in a minute, just got to go ben the other room.

not really an interesting colloquialism or anything, but when my gran first met my auntie's 2nd husband she whispered to my mum "She better get him insured, he'll be in the ground before me".

He was known as "Yellow Eddie" because he worked at LB Dyes for 30 years and must have been getting all the worst jobs because he literally was yellow and looked quite cadaverous in the best of health. He only died this year funnily enough, beating my gran by 18 years.

Today I sent Dan a photo of a 30ft cwtch.

My grandmother on my mother's side said strange things that never made sense to me. She came from a weird, desiccated Dutch old money family. She told me a story of how her three great aunts were draped in robes and watched her when she was sent off overseas or some bullshit like that.

What the hell is that? I still don't know what the fuck that is. I'll take this folksy crap in a heartbeat.

My granny always called my grandfather (named William, Bill to friends) Wal, rhyming with pal.

From out of nowhere, I remembered a word my dad was fond of using, dighted, which means daft, stupid or crazy. I assume it's from the verb, to dight, which means, among other things, to wipe clean.

Whenever she would arrive home from somewhere, my grandmother would say "Home again, home again, jiggity jig."

I don't say it out loud, but to this day it runs through my head quite often.

Menage (pronounced 'menodge')

http://www.dsl.ac.uk/entry/snd/menage

Whenever she would arrive home from somewhere, my grandmother would say "Home again, home again, jiggity jig."

It's a line from an old nursery rhyme "To market, to market"

(xp) Apparently from the French, manège, the profitable employment of money.

You may be confusing 'manège' (amusement ride, riding hall, crafty behaviour, etc.) and 'ménage' (housekeeping, relationship).

Yes, I was going by what they said on the site I linked to.

Interesting. The confusion is likely due to the word's phonetic and semantic similarity with 'management'.

Apparently still in use too:

Nowadays this word survives as an observation on how incompetent people or governments manage their affairs as in the following from the Herald of 12th September 2017: “We Scots had lacked confidence in the ability of our leaders and institutions to run a menodge.” This use is further illustrated, again from the Herald in the letters page of 12th November 2015: “As we say in the west of Scotland, could this lot manage a menodge.”

Manage a menodge, nice phrase.

Heh, that's awesome. It kind of makes sense too, since 'manage' and 'ménage' ultimately stem from two separate Latin roots: manus (the hand) and maneo (to stay, to dwell), respectively. So to manage a menodge is in some sense to handle a dwelling.

Not my granny but my mum, but she probably got it from her granny:

Sleeping your head into train oil or, as my mum would say, "Ye'll sleep yer heid intae train oil".

This one really used to confuse me because, in Scots, oil is pronounced like 'isle', so I had no idea where this place Train Isle was or how you could sleep yourself into it.

And even when I'd figured out it was 'oil' and not 'isle', I was still none the wiser, I mean what is train oil? Oil for lubricating trains? And, again, how do you sleep yourself into it? But, it turns out that train oil is whale oil - which your brain will turn into if you sleep too long.

My dad used that one a lot but it was more like "listening to that'll turn your brain to train oil", or "your brain'll turn to train oil if you keep on watching that". He would have been talking about stuff like the Boomtown Rats and Rentaghost so probably OTM.

'train oil' was most likely in the form of a greasy sludge

I thought it was 'dod' but apparently it's 'daud'.

https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/daud

... as in "Gie's a daud o' that bread".

Not really grannyspeak because I say it myself, but only in my head, as no-one else would know what I was talking about.

"Gie's a daud o' that bread"

iirc one of the Apostles says that in Billy Connolly's 'Crucifixion' routine

LOL that must have been deep in the memory banks somewhere.

Sclaff

As in, thank you BBC Scotland for allowing the nation to once again relive Billy Bremner sclaffing that ball wide of the post against the worst Brazil team in history in the '74 World Cup.

My mom's golf group was called the Sclaffers.

had no idea it was an actual word that other people used!

Yes, it's used a lot in golf!

Along with skite.

I sclaffed my shot and it skited off a tree

and skliff

I sclaffed my shot and it skited off a tree so I skliffed off to find the ball

I think that just means a segment of an orange where I'm from.

I use sclaff. I have not heard skite or skliff. But I have used skiff - to very barely hit something. Usually in Subbuteo or pool. "That's two shots." "Naw, I skiffed it."

Oh yeah, skiff is another one. Surprised you haven't heard skite, it's quite a common one.

Michael Rosen’s Twitter feed has an absolute treasure trove of these that he either retweeted right before going into hospital or someone in his family RTed for him

i.e.

"I'm standing 'ere like cheese at fourpence......."

— David Setchell (@DGSetchell) March 27, 2020

Puggled = exhausted, spent, on your last legs.

"Huv seen the state o' yon Boris Johnson? Looks puggled tae me".

Switch = to beat (eggs) or mix.

"Gie's that egg and ah'll switch it up in a cup fer ye."

Clap = to pat affectionately, caressingly, approvingly.

"Ye can gie the dug a clap, he'll no' bite ye."

these are so great.

Tea jenny = A person who drinks a lot of tea; a tea addict; someone fussy about tea. noun.

Stave = 3. To sprain, bruise or contuse a joint of the body.

"Whit's wi' th' bandage?"
"Oh this? A' staved ma' thumb last night".

Pronouncing "lunatic" to rhyme with "pneumatic".

My Gran (Paisley born) had a brilliant reserve of bastardized French terms, I really wish I had written them all down before she passed, I only remember the more obvious ones - Stank, Ashet, Jigot.

I think my fave saying of her's was 'What's fur ye, will no go by ye'

Now you're talking my language... literally.

I don't know if this is a Paisley/Renfrew thing or not, but I also liked her punctuation of 'says I' (start) and 'ah sais' (end) in a sentence.

With the added potential confusion of 'aye' and "I', I remember her saying to me once 'says I, aye, ah sais'

What are "stank, ashet, jigot"?
(sounds like a law firm...)

Overshoes meaning boots

Stank as in very smelly in the past tense?

Ashet is a cooking dish, and specifically one you make/buy a steak pie in and is from assiette.

Jigot is spelled gigot, like the French, because it's a centre cut lamb leg chop.

Stank is a drain, but I think it's also used to describe stagnant water.

That's me learnt.

Ta (as my granny used to say...)

XP or Telt :)

oh yeah as in “that’s that doon the stank”

Stank is a drain, from Old French, estanc for a pond or lake

Ashet, I know from ashet pie, is a large dish, from the French for plate, assiette.

Gigot (not Jigot) is a leg of mutton or lamb, taken directly from the French

To this day, I call those Vicks inhaler sticks "mentholatum," as that is how my grandfather (1917-1993) always referred to them.

Beelin' = angry, furious

"Ah'm beelin' Scotland were in Pot 2 in the Euro draw and still ended up gettin' the same sides they aye get".

Aye = always
[img=https://i.ebayimg.com/thumbs/images/g/kBYAAOSwmoxh6BP9/s-l300.jpg]https://i.ebayimg.com/thumbs/images/g/kBYAAOSwmoxh6BP9/s-l300.jpg[/img]

Oops...

[img=https://i.ebayimg.com/thumbs/images/g/kBYAAOSwmoxh6BP9/s-l300.jpg]https://i.ebayimg.com/thumbs/images/g/kBYAAOSwmoxh6BP9/s-l300.jpg[/img]

Fuck it, it's refusing to work.

'Aye...funny man, d'y think his heid zips up the back...?' (told to a young me, in reference to my Grandad)

“if it’s me on bongos and Mark E Smith, then it’s The Fall”

https://i.ebayimg.com/thumbs/images/g/kBYAAOSwmoxh6BP9/s-l300.jpg

My old nan was from Wakefield. She'd mostly lost her accent by the end of her life but never sounded so Yorkshire as when she used her catchphrase: 's/he's short of nowt he's got'.

my grandma was kind of a self hating cockney who took elocution lessons and alcohol would change her accent and manner entirely (in a good and fun way most of the time)

keeker = black eye

Which, of course, is derived from one of my favourite Scots words.

https://www.dsl.ac.uk/entry/snd/keek_v1_n1

I bet ye were up tae high doh!

― We Buy a Hammer For Dadaismus (Dada), Wednesday, 7 December 2005 16:53 (seventeen years ago) bookmarkflaglink

Couthy continuity announcer on Channel 4 has just used this phrase.

fellas I’ve had a good run but I think I’ve finally had the radish

I heard a Northern Irishman use 'up tae high do' a few years ago, interesting that it had legs, and I always wondered if it was related to 'do, re, mi, fa, so, la, ti, do'

My sister just sent a message to say she's got some terrible cleg bites on her leg.

cleg: another term for horsefly

Mercy, that's one I haven't heard in yonks