The how much?
Marius Hancu
Is this
"The how much?"
frequently used as a double-take(BrE)?
---
[Talking about a mule driver]
"He is the _agoyatis_ of Mr. Conchis."
"The how much?"
"He has a donkey. He takes the mail and the foot to Bourani."
John Fowles, The Magus, p. 59
---
Thanks.
Marius Hancu
Tony Cooper
wrote:
You asked about BrE, but in AmE that would be in the "What's an
agoyatis when he's at home?" category. Most of us have some stock
phrase that we sometimes use when we don't understand a word or term.
There are probably hundreds of them. It would be frequently used if
it was your family's stock phrase, and never used if your family used
a different one.
--
Tony Cooper
Orlando, FL
mike.j...@gmail.com
Marius, if you read the rubbish written by John Fowles, you will pretty
soon addle your brain. Stop now, while there is still a chance!
Mike M
> On Sun, 21 Jan 2007 19:12:57 -0500, Marius Hancu <NOS...@videotron.ca>
> wrote:
>
> >Hello:
> >
> >Is this
> >"The how much?"
> >frequently used as a double-take(BrE)?
> >
> >---
> >[Talking about a mule driver]
> >
> >"He is the _agoyatis_ of Mr. Conchis."
> >"The how much?"
> >"He has a donkey. He takes the mail and the foot to Bourani."
> >
> >John Fowles, The Magus, p. 59
> >---
>
> You asked about BrE, but in AmE that would be in the "What's an
> agoyatis when he's at home?" category.
>
As indeed it would in BrE. "The how much" is a new one on me.
Mike M
Derek Turner
No, but easily understood. Where I come from 'we had one of those but
the wheel came off so my Mam gave it to the rag-man.' would be a
more-likely and frequently-heard response.
Marius Hancu
Derek Turner wrote:
> > "He is the _agoyatis_ of Mr. Conchis."
> > "The how much?"
> > "He has a donkey. He takes the mail and the foot to Bourani."
>
> No, but easily understood. Where I come from 'we had one of those but
> the wheel came off so my Mam gave it to the rag-man.' would be a
> more-likely and frequently-heard response.
Now, what would be the origin/meaning of _that_ one?
BTW, didn't get any Google hits on:
"wheel came off * rag-man"
Marius Hancu
Oleg Lego
I haven't heard this except in the shorter version, which was commonly
heard when I was growing up in Western Canada.
"I had one, but the wheel(s) fell off."
Google supplies a lot of hits for "but the wheels fell off", but they
are mostly in the sense of describing a failure in sport or other
endeavours, as in "The Argonauts were doing well in the first half,
but the wheels fell off"
Making "wheels" singular gives a lot more relevant hits.
jerry_f...@yahoo.com
> On Sun, 21 Jan 2007 19:12:57 -0500, Marius Hancu <NOS...@videotron.ca>
> wrote:
>
> >Hello:
> >
> >Is this
> >"The how much?"
> >frequently used as a double-take(BrE)?
> >
> >---
> >[Talking about a mule driver]
> >
> >"He is the _agoyatis_ of Mr. Conchis."
> >"The how much?"
> >"He has a donkey. He takes the mail and the foot to Bourani."
> >
> >John Fowles, The Magus, p. 59
> >---
>
> You asked about BrE, but in AmE that would be in the "What's an
> agoyatis when he's at home?" category.
I've seen that often in British books, but I don't remember ever
hearing it in America or seeing it in an American book.
> Most of us have some stock
> phrase that we sometimes use when we don't understand a word or term.
...
Mine are "A what?" and "What's an agoyatis?" and "I don't know what
that is". Witty and picturesque, don't you think?
--
Jerry Friedman
Mike Lyle
I suddenly remember that my father (b. 1918, Aus) used to use it. I
can't remember hearing it from anybody else; but I wouldn't have been
surprised if I had.
--
Mike.
--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com
Cece
Mike Lyle ha escrito:
I've never heard it, but I've read it, in fiction written in the UK
long ago. Ngaio Marsh? Georgette Heyer (mysteries, not romances)?
Josephine Tey?
Cece
Robin Bignall
wrote:
A rag-man is probably a rag-and-bone man: a totter, a person who went
from house to house collecting junk for resale. "Steptoe and Son" was
a famous British TV comedy about rag-and-bone men.
--
Robin
Herts, England
mike.j...@gmail.com
> BTW, didn't get any Google hits on:
> "wheel came off * rag-man"
>
> Marius Hancu
"Wheel came off" has already been satisfactorily explained. As for
"rag-man", when I was a small child (1952-1960) in London, the
"rag-and-bone man" was a well known figure. Driving a horse and cart,
he would progress along the street ringing a handbell. People would
bring out unwanted items such as saucepans with holes in them or
without handles, old clothes, in short, recycleable junk. I am not sure
whether he paid for these things or whether they were donated. He would
make his living by sorting the items eg the clothing would be separated
into white and coloured, cotton and wool, etc and selling them to scrap
merchants in bulk. Nobody ever seemed to give him bones. "Only fit for
the rag-and-bone man" was a common phrase meaning "worn out, beyond
further use". "Knackered" still means roughly the same thing in UK
slang. (A knacker recycled horses).
Harry Lethall
> > BTW, didn't get any Google hits on:
> > "wheel came off * rag-man"
> "Wheel came off" has already been satisfactorily explained. As for
> "rag-man", when I was a small child (1952-1960) in London, the
> "rag-and-bone man" was a well known figure. Driving a horse and cart,
> he would progress along the street ringing a handbell.
"rag-and-bone man"! God! I have not heard term that since the last time I
saw Steptoe & Son. When I was a kid the local RABM used to give away
dirt-cheap plastic bumble bees that made a horrendous racket when you spun
them on the bit of thread.
But does anyone rember the tinker, on his modified bicycle with attached
grindstone? Sorry, this probably predates that new silly program ont he
wireless - the Goons.
contrex
On 24 Jan, 14:38, "Harry Lethall" <oei...@NOSPAAM.hotmail.com> wrote:
> "rag-and-bone man"! God! I have not heard term that since the last time I
> saw Steptoe & Son.
I was a little confused the first time I saw him, or rather his cart.
It didn't look like the carts in my story books, that is with spoked
wheels with solid rims. His cart had wheels with pneumatic rubber tyres
like those on a motor lorry (truck). Coal was delivered by a much
dirtier cart with a much cleaner horse, which seemed a bit of a paradox
to me.
CDB
[...]
> But does anyone rember the tinker, on his modified bicycle with
> attached grindstone? Sorry, this probably predates that new silly
> program ont he wireless - the Goons.
Did he only sharpen bades? We still have those here in Ottawa, called
"scissors-grinders" in our house. Until about the eighties, they
walked slowly through the neighbourhood, pushing a wheeled grindstone
and ringing an old-fashioned school bell to alert potential customers.
Most recently, the one who sharpened my lawnmower blade (badly) last
summer drove his van slowly through, and the bell was automated.
Mike Lyle
The 'sixties Oxford one had an old bike. His drill was to put the bike
on a kickstand, detach the chain from the back sprocket and put it on
some simple though Heath-Robinsonian way of transferring the drive from
the pedals to the grindstone. Part of his shtick was to make a point of
showing customers his own pocket knife, which was as blunt as could be.
He then made you guess how much to pay him, which was a smart business
move.
But he didn't cry "Knives, scissors, and razors to grind!" as the
literature tells us was traditional.
When I was a child, scissors were treated as rather precious objects: I
doubt if our family had more than three pairs including the nail
scissors. This results in one of my eccentricities: I don't know for
sure, but I think there are probably a dozen pairs of scissors of all
kinds within thirty feet of me. These days I think people just throw
them away when they get blunt: but when my daughter was a restaurant
manager, a bloke used to come round and grind all the kitchen knives
every week, so the trade hasn't died out.
Peter Moylan
> "Wheel came off" has already been satisfactorily explained. As for
> "rag-man", when I was a small child (1952-1960) in London, the
> "rag-and-bone man" was a well known figure. Driving a horse and cart,
> he would progress along the street ringing a handbell. People would
> bring out unwanted items such as saucepans with holes in them or
> without handles, old clothes, in short, recycleable junk.
Did other countries have the bottle-oh? He was, in effect, a Steptoe who
specialised in glass bottles. Part of my childhood income came from
selling used beer bottles to the bottle-oh. (Another part came from
selling piles of newspaper to butchers and fish shops.)
--
Peter Moylan http://www.pmoylan.org
Please note the changed e-mail and web addresses. The domain
eepjm.newcastle.edu.au no longer exists, and I can no longer
receive mail at my newcastle.edu.au addresses. The optusnet
address could disappear at any time.
Sara Lorimer
> The 'sixties Oxford one had an old bike. His drill was to put the bike
> on a kickstand, detach the chain from the back sprocket and put it on
> some simple though Heath-Robinsonian way of transferring the drive from
> the pedals to the grindstone. Part of his shtick was to make a point of
> showing customers his own pocket knife, which was as blunt as could be.
> He then made you guess how much to pay him, which was a smart business
> move.
I saw a man like that once in my neighborhood, about six years ago. I
had hoped he would set up on a regular schedule, so I could bring him my
knives to sharpen, but he never appeared again. Which is particularly
odd... where did he go? How did he happen to show up just once?
--
SML
Nick Spalding
<1hshj77.j0sox5eiv29sN%que.sara....@gmail.com>
on Thu, 25 Jan 2007 07:24:45 -0800:
Maybe he did get enough trade in your area to make it worth his while.
--
Nick Spalding