Listener comments!

Fri. 6/5/09 6:04pm From: Danne D

hola weirdos

Fri. 6/5/09 6:05pm From: Danne D

Cows coming home was the (only) highlight to the visits to my grandparents house in Sussex county growing up. Not a heckuva lot to do up there.

Fri. 6/5/09 6:05pm From: Eric X

How about "move over"? What the hell does that mean?

Fri. 6/5/09 6:07pm From: Frankie

I avoid cliches like the plague.

Fri. 6/5/09 6:09pm From: John McCabe in LA

This slang term originated in about 1970. At that time, i.e. pre the widespread use of the Internet, slang terms often circulated at street level for many years before being adopted by anyone who felt inclined to write them down. That's clearly not the case any longer of course and any word or phrase that is widely known is dateable quite precisely via website logs.

Fri. 6/5/09 6:09pm From: darue

My bad

Meaning

My mistake - I'm to blame.

Origin

This slang term originated in about 1970. At that time, i.e. pre the widespread use of the Internet, slang terms often circulated at street level for many years before being adopted by anyone who felt inclined to write them down. That's clearly not the case any longer of course and any word or phrase that is widely known is dateable quite precisely via website logs.

The first citation in print is C. Wielgus and A. Wolff's, 'Back-in-your-face Guide to Pick-up Basketball', 1986:

"My bad, an expression of contrition uttered after making a bad pass or missing an opponent."

Shakespeare used the term with something like the current meaning, in his Sonnet 112:

Your love and pity doth the impression fill
Which vulgar scandal stamp'd upon my brow;
For what care I who calls me well or ill,
So you o'er-green my bad, my good allow?

That's clearly just coincidence, and it's hardly surprising that such a fragmentary phrase would appear in a large body of work like Shakespeare's. It's also a world away from pick-up basketball, which is an informal street sport where players frequently call out to each other (trash talking), and is a well-known source of street lang.

clueless'My bad' came into widespread popular use in the mid to late-1990s in the USA via the 1995 movie “Clueless”. This starred Alicia Silverstone and contains what seems to have been the first use of the phrase in the mainstream media. The 1994 'Green revision pages' for the movie script has a scene with Alicia Silverstone's character learning to drive:

"Cher swerves - to avoid killing a person on a bicycle. Cher: Whoops, my bad."

Although a street term, it is virtually synonymous with the earlier Latin phrase, 'mea culpa'. It doubtless has as little of a direct descent from this as it does from Shakespeare's Sonnet 112.

'My bad' has gained that unequivocal accolade - imitation. In REM's 2004 song 'Leaving New York' there is this verse, which as you see includes 'my proud':

You might have laughed if I told you
You might have hidden a frown
You might have succeeded in changing me
I might have been turned around
It's easier to leave than to be left behind
Leaving was never my proud
Leaving New York, never easy
I saw the light fading out

The Doonesbury cartoon strip for 14th June 2006 included this:

"Okay, I'm bitter that I have to support myself! There I said it! My brave."

Fri. 6/5/09 6:10pm From: John McCabe in LA

that was for my bad

Fri. 6/5/09 6:11pm From: John McCabe in LA

see www.phrases.org.uk

Fri. 6/5/09 6:11pm From: Danne D

I like the version of the "my bad" story from allwords.com even if it's wrong:
"Seems to have originated from a phrase by Manute Bol, A player of Sudanese origin for Golden State Warriors in Bay area. Other players picked it up and started using it.

Fri. 6/5/09 6:12pm From: jack

"The man" comes from "the management"

Fri. 6/5/09 6:14pm From: Danne D

Some of these are so subtle. I mean that is so "corny"? What the heck does "corny" come from?!?

The answer (possibly is that folks are picking on the Cornish)...

Fri. 6/5/09 6:18pm From: John McCabe in LA

Shakespeare Wrote half of these Benjamin Franklin did the other half

Fri. 6/5/09 6:19pm From: Colan Rodgers

hey andy heres a weird russian one. Я съел собаку

Fri. 6/5/09 6:21pm From: Colan R

also face the music or woke up on the wrong side of the bed ?

Fri. 6/5/09 6:22pm From: Danne D

I always thought when I was a kid that the "Carter has liver pills" thing was about Jimmy Carter, even though you'd figure that it was Billy Carter that would be the one that needed them.

Fri. 6/5/09 6:25pm From: Danne D

One version of ____eating grin:
http://everything2.com/node/1362961

Fri. 6/5/09 6:26pm From: listener colan

frangry wheres the vodka?! you are hilarious with it. big fan guys

Fri. 6/5/09 6:28pm From: Danne D

Booyah!

Fri. 6/5/09 6:30pm From: Danne D

Keep your eyes peeled:
http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-kee1.htm

Fri. 6/5/09 6:31pm From: Jake

"It is what it is" is on PeevePile with a lot of these annoying sayings: http://peevepile.com/peeves/1339

Fri. 6/5/09 6:35pm From: Gray G.

"Mind Your P's and Qs"

Fri. 6/5/09 6:35pm From: Danne D

Btw: looks like 34 minutes (plus internet) lag is the winner for the Frangry boredom pool.

Fri. 6/5/09 6:36pm From: Turbo

"as god made little green apples..."

Fri. 6/5/09 6:36pm From: colan r

urban dictionary says that blowing smoke up a butt means is most literally translating to "trying to get a reaction" out of somebody. Originated from a 16th century technique to determine death by literally blowing tobacco smoke into someone's butt (through a long pipe) - where a reaction indicated that the person was still alive.

Fri. 6/5/09 6:37pm From: Danne D

Shut Up Weirdo:
Where socialites meet social-lites.

Fri. 6/5/09 6:39pm From: Turbo

"dead as a doornail"

Fri. 6/5/09 6:40pm From: Gray G.

Let's get down to Brass Tacks

Fri. 6/5/09 6:41pm From: Yakov Smirnoff

In America, noodles hang ears on you.

Fri. 6/5/09 6:41pm From: colan r

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=blowing+smoke+up+your+ass

Fri. 6/5/09 6:42pm From: "Andy"

A likely story, for the love of crackers.

Fri. 6/5/09 6:42pm From: Danne D

It was Beer Ball Wednesday at the office Frangry? :)

Fri. 6/5/09 6:43pm From: Gray G.

where does Frangry work? gotta find a way to annoy here while she's actually getting paid to do something productive

Fri. 6/5/09 6:43pm From: The Man

I had her boss give her some needed buying-the-supervisor's-lie training after work. It's like detention for adults.

Fri. 6/5/09 6:48pm From: Danne D

saw that same explanation about magic with the smoke up the butt - supposedly "the butt" was added later. I think "Blow Sunshine Out Your Ass" might be the funnier variation though - I mean what the hell does THAT mean?

Fri. 6/5/09 6:49pm From: Danne D

Facebook group: "Do you blow sunshine out your ass all the time? Can you blow some my way?"
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2255843267

Fri. 6/5/09 6:52pm From: ume

sing for your supper

Fri. 6/5/09 6:53pm From: John McCabe in LA

hey everybody join "Weirdos for Frangry " on face book

Fri. 6/5/09 6:54pm From: Hint

To flirt with someone you have to figure they actually like someone other than themselves...

Fri. 6/5/09 6:54pm From: Danne D

Sure, the next time I both to ever getting around to going on facebook again...i set up my facebook basically to have my friend stop bugging me to set up a facebook

Fri. 6/5/09 6:56pm From: ?

Dude, it's "flirt" not "bad bar chat"

Fri. 6/5/09 6:58pm From: Premise Police

stupid folk etymologies. try the American Dialect Society listserv for some actual expertise, and not wack made up stories...

Fri. 6/5/09 6:58pm From: Danne D

Expertise is overrated.

Fri. 6/5/09 7:00pm From: mhm

not by those who have worked on a topic

Sat. 6/6/09 12:32am From: my bad

9 minutes into the show and I had to listen to Erik's annoying and condescending voice. UGH. Sorry it was such a dealbreaker for me. Couldn't listen to the whole show now. And Frangry, you're recommending Revolutionary Road, now that it was made into a film with DiCaprio and Winslet? What if the film wasn't made with those actors? Better yet, what if that book wasn't made into film at all? Girl, you're dumb (and just because you have a Master's doesn't make you smart). Your Bad.Better yet, your mom's bad. Hasta La Vista. I hope Ken finally wakes up to his senses and cancel this show.

Sun. 6/7/09 9:51pm From: joey

this show needs TWO hours!! so short one hour!

Mon. 6/8/09 1:18am From: John McCabe in LA

re “my bad” (or in other words too much of a coward to use your real name)
your obviously a serious dick head that can't come to terms with your own feelings about Frangry this frustrates you and causes you to lash out in inappropriate ways my advise is to eat shit and die.
In spite of all that,
have a good one

Tue. 6/9/09 3:30pm From: listening from afghanistan

Once again, great show. Maybe it's just the fact that I've been sitting here in the desert with a bunch of guys for the last year, but christ frangry, you are a darling of a morale boost. Thanks guys.

Tue. 6/9/09 3:34pm From: listening from afghanistan

btw, john mccabe is my fucking hero!

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