My newspaper published a letter today - a woman's three-year-old granddaughter kept asking her if she could be allowed to "wash up"*, but was told repeatedly that she was too young. Eventually the woman found out that she'd actually been asking if she could "watch Up!", the Disney/Pixar movie, on DVD.

* This shows the UK/US English divide. In the UK, "washing up" refers exclusively to the cleaning of dishes, pots, pans, and so on. We'd normally say "having a wash" or just "washing" when talking about washing ourselves.

This is such a sweet story, Arnie. Around here, we hate to "wash up," but we love to watch Up! We especially love Doug, the golden retriever.

In the U.S. what you call "washing up liquid," we call "dish detergent." I first became aware of this difference in terms when visiting my sister and her (now) ex-husband while he was doing a study leave at Oxford in the '90s.

I hope the grandma let her granddaughter watch Up! after all that confusion.

WM

My brother used to think "wash up" meant put on more deodorant.

In the training world, "wash-up" means the finalising of a training course - handing out certificates, collecting the bits and pieces, putting away the equipment, etc.

I have long thought that "washed up" meant past the point of usefulness.

WM, have you ever seen "wash up" mean to wash up for dinner? That's what we used to call it.

Oh, yes, "wash up" could mean "go wash your hands before coming to the table," but it didn't mean "do the dishes."

WM

Seeems to me I"ve heard the term used at least once or twice to mean go to the bathroom.

quote:

Originally posted by Proofreader:
Seeems to me I"ve heard the term used at least once or twice to mean go to the bathroom.

It seems eminently reasonable to me to wash (or even bath) in a bathroom.

I was using a euphemism to avoid saying shit.

quote:

Seeems to me I"ve heard the term used at least once or twice to mean go to the bathroom.

Isn't that more like, "I've got to go powder my nose"?

Or "freshen up," to avoid saying "tinkle!"

WM

We've remarked before several times on the huge number of euphemisms used for emptying one's bladder and/or bowels. See here, for example. Probably the only activities that attract similar numbers of euphemisms are having sex and getting drunk.

Never heard of "off for a Jimmy" before. Over here, to "Jimmy" means to pry open.

Wordmatic

Hereabouts "Jimmies" are sugar dots of chocolate that you dip an ice cream cone into.

quote:

Originally posted by wordmatic:
Never heard of "off for a Jimmy" before. Over here, to "Jimmy" means to pry open.

Wordmatic

A "Jimmy" is Cockney Rhyming Slang derived from "Jimmy Riddle" = "piddle".

The verb in the UK from prying something open comes from the noun for the tool used for the job - a jemmy.

Or, here, you could "jimmy" a lock.

quote:

Originally posted by Kalleh:
Or, here, you could "jimmy" a lock.

We'd normally say "jemmy" in that case, as Richard said..

Kalleh, I guess we corrupted their "jemmy" into a "jimmy." I've never heard of a jemmy, which I will now have to look up.

It says "variant of jimmy, chiefly British." And that a "jimmy" is a short crowbar with curved ends. That's the American Heritage Dictionary.

WM

According to the OED Online, Jemmy is a pet name for James. Jimmy is “dialect and colloquial pronunciation of jemmy n." A Jemmy is also “a crowbar used by burglars, generally made in sections screwing together.” It's also called a Jemmy Rock or James. I couldn't find anything that said why a crowbar is called a jemmy, but I wonder if Jemmy Rock is rhyming slang, perhaps something like, “Break the lock with Jemmy Rock.”

Apparently it's named for a character in an O Henry short story and the play and film based on that. See the Wikipedia entry for Alias Jimmy Valentine.

The Wikipedia page for Crowbar says "The term jemmy or jimmy (named for a fictional burglar*) most often refers to the tool when used for burglary."

* This is a link to the Alias Jimmy Valentine page.

Certainly all the references I have seen refer to "Jimmy Riddle" as the origin of the Cockney slang term, although I have been unable to find out who Jimmy Riddle was.

Either his fame has now been eclipsed - as for example, that of the jockey Todd Sloane (whose name was the origin of the CRS phrase "on his tod" meaning "on his own") or as this site suggests - http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/211900.html - he never existed.

There was apparently an American country musician named Jimmy Riddle (1918-1982) but he can't have been the eponymous Jimmy as the phrase existed before he was born. However, if he'd known about the Cockney rhyming slang use of his name I expect he'd have changed it!

Jimmy Riddle is rhyming slang for piddle. This site says it was coined in the "late 19th century." The OED's first citation is from Eric Partridge's 1937 A Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English.

Jimmy Valentine was a fictional character in O. Henry's short story, A Retrieved Reformation, published in 1909. Jemmy Rock was mentioned in an 1811 citation in the OED:

quote:

1811 Lexicon Balatronicum, Jemmy, a crow‥much used by house~breakers. Sometimes called Jemmy Rock.

Lexicon Balatronicum (The Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue) was written by Captain Francis Grose in 1811. You can see this predates both Jimmy Riddle and Jimmie Valentine.