Holy Cow!

by Boze Hadleigh

How did the bird become identified with craziness? Human judgment. Expert swimmers who can dive as deep as 250 feet beneath the surface to catch food, loons are clumsy on land, their legs positioned well back on their bodies. They have trouble becoming airborne from land or water. They also rear straight up in the water, flapping their wings while moving horizontally to scare off intruders. Then there are the calls of the loon, some comparable to the laugh of a madman and most sounding peculiar to human ears (some are audible up to two miles away). Each call has a meaning to the loon issuing it, and to other loons.

  The loon got its name in the early 1600s. The expression crazy as a loon spread among European settlers in North America—in Britain the bird is called a diver—and by the late 1800s, loony was slang for nuts. However, there are loon fossils from 20 million years ago, and their ancestry goes back about 70 million years. Loons—or divers—are among the oldest, therefore most successful, living birds. How crazy is that?

  To Lay an Egg

  Why this is considered a bad thing (it’s good when chickens do it) is unknown. Sources say it could be related to calling a failed play a “turkey,” which has been widespread since the 1920s and occurs in Irving Berlin’s song “There’s No Business Like Show Business.” The most famous use of the expression was Variety’s headline on October 30, 1929, referring to the previous day: “Wall Street Lays an Egg.” It explained, “The most dramatic event in the financial history of America is the collapse of the New York Stock Market.”

  The term was borrowed from show business, and Variety, founded in 1905, is the entertainment newspaper of record. Proof that the expression was little known outside showbiz was that it went virtually unused in any other coverage of the stock market crash. The Variety mention may have been the expression’s first appearance in print, except for one other that year, a line in J. P. McEvoy’s Hollywood Girl—“Boys, it looks like we laid an egg.”

  Again, why a fertilized ovum became associated with a public flop or disaster remains a mystery, but not every showbiz egg has referred to a “turkey.” When double-Oscar-winner Jodie Foster formed her own production company, she named it Egg because an egg is a female product and is self-contained. Back when Jodie was still in the closet, comedy doyenne Dame Edna Everage, referring to Foster’s fluency in French, called her a “cunning little linguist.” (If you don’t understand that, it’s simple: Dame is the female equivalent of Sir, each having been knighted by the Queen, and a queen is either a king’s wife or a female monarch. Simple?)

  Laying Eggs

  During World War I (1914–1918) fighter pilots created the slang term laying eggs, for dropping bombs. Referencing of course the bombs’ shape and their being ejected from a plane’s belly. If it was one bomb, the pilot may have said he laid an egg.

  Speaking of bombs, the expression that a show or performer bombed (or failed, related to the preceding egg entry) was unknown during either world war. It gained popular currency in the 1960s.

  P.S. One reason this writer won on Jeopardy! in 1998 was when I first visited Quebec, Canada, I read that animal pelts had long ago been common currency there, that is, used as money. My “Final Jeopardy!” category was Financial History.

  (Pelt derives from Olde English pellet, meaning skin.)

  Don’t Count Your Chickens

  Again, Aesop gets the credit, ca. 570 BCE. Everyone knows the expression means to not count on something prematurely or desire something too strongly before it’s a possibility. But the story “The Milkmaid and Her Pail” is a little more complex than that. In it, the farmer’s daughter daydreams while walking to market with a pail of milk balanced on her head. She imagines the milk will yield cream which she’ll turn into butter which she’ll sell at market, then buy several eggs that will hatch into chickens that will lay more eggs so she’ll have a big poultry yard, then sell some of the hens and purchase a beautiful dress to visit the fair in, where the boys will dance attention upon her but she’ll merely toss her head and ignore them. Daydreaming this, she tosses her head and loses the original pail of milk. Back home, Mama consoles and warns her, “Don’t count your chickens before they’re hatched.”

  The even more practical don’t put all your eggs in one basket is much more recent, dating from the 18th century.

  FYI: The reason some chickens lay white eggs and others brown has to do with a hen’s breed. White eggs are far more popular, though both eggs’ quality is the same. An easy way to gauge the color of a hen’s eggs is her earlobes: if they’re white, so are her eggs; if red, her eggs will be brown. An egg yolk’s color depends on what the chicken is fed. If she eats white corn, her yolks will be colorless, but that’s unpopular, so her diet is designed to produce yellow to orange yolks.

  Egg. . .

  An egg tooth is a tough white protuberance on the beak or jaw of an embryonic bird or reptile which facilitates its breaking out of the shell.

  Egg roll is an odd name for a Chinese appetizer whose crisp deep-fried dough is made with eggs—on that basis, the names of countless foods could start with “egg.” Egg rolls are often incorrectly labeled spring rolls, which are filled pancakes. (A springtail is a teeny wingless insect which springs upward when alarmed.)

  Hundred-year-old eggs aren’t really that old, but have been coated in an ash, rice, or lime mixture, then left—often buried—for up to six months. Even so, most Chinese housewives who order them ask that they be delivered “fresh.” Tea eggs are hard-boiled and soaked in tea to produce a delicate marbled effect.

  (Years ago, at an ice cream parlor, I asked the difference between the flavors vanilla and the pricier French vanilla. I was coolly informed, “French vanilla has eggs.” I felt like saying I didn’t realize the French had invented eggs.)

  Good Egg, Bad Egg

  An egg may look fine on the outside but be rotten inside the shell, like some humans. In the same way that bird, duck, or party, etc., may refer to an individual (“She’s a strange bird,” “He’s an odd duck”), so does egg—positively or negatively. In Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and its film versions Verruca Salt, a spoiled young heiress, gets dumped down a chute because she’s a bad egg.

  The phrase “a bad egg” first saw print in 1855 in Samuel A. Hammett’s novel Captain Priest: “In the language of his class the Perfect Bird generally turns out to be a bad egg.” By the 20th century the phrase was also being used positively, as in “Joe’s a pretty good egg.”

  FYI, Grade AA eggs are “general purpose with thick whites and firm yolks that are virtually free from defects.” Grade A eggs are “also general purpose but may have a defect or two.” Grade B eggs are “not usually sold at retail but are usable for general cooking and baking.” (USDA ratings of fruits and vegetables are A, B, and C.)

  A dozen Extra Large eggs must weigh at least 27 ounces. A dozen Large eggs must weigh at least 24 ounces. A dozen Medium eggs must weigh at least 21 ounces. Egg-cellent information?

  Egg-less

  To egg someone on, that is, to urge or incite them to do something (often foolish or risky) derives not from edible eggs but the Old Norse eggja, “to incite.” Likewise, an egg cream doesn’t involve eggs but, rather, milk, soda water, and flavored syrup. And eggplant is a North American name for aubergine, which is also the vegetable’s color—actually it’s a fruit, eaten as a vegetable.

  An egghead is an intellectual. In days of old (“when knights were bold and teachers weren’t invented . . .”) it was commonly thought the human brain could hold only so much knowledge. This anti-learning epithet implies that “excessive” reading or studying might expand the head upwards into an ovoid shape! Agatha Christie often described her brilliant Belgian detective Hercules Poirot as having an egg-shaped head. (Better an egghead than a Humpty-Dumpty.)

  As Sure as Eggs

  “As sure as eggs is eggs,” though grammatically incorrect, expresses absolute certainty. But it’s a misquote of the basic mathematical formula “x is x,” stating complete certitude. How x became eggs sound
s obvious, but when is uncertain, although Charles Dickens helped popularize the phrase in his 1837 novel The Pickwick Papers.

  “Don’t teach your grandmother to suck eggs” is almost obsolete but means “don’t try to teach your elders something they probably already know.” The expression reflected the practicality of toothless people eating eggs, raw or otherwise. In time, with more dentistry and a wider diet, the expression was partly replaced by the contemptuous “go suck an egg” uttered to comic effect by Cloris Leachman in an early episode of her TV sitcom Phyllis.

  Pecking

  To hen-peck is what a hen theoretically does to a rooster with her bill—technically it should be rooster-peck. For humans, it refers to a husband whose “hen” habitually pecks or picks on him, that is, she rules the roost. Philologist Mario Pei explained, “Although the verb to peck is of unknown source, ‘peck’ may come from a root meaning to protrude.” Pecker in the United States is vulgar slang for a penis, while in Britain it means chin—both typically protrude—as in the expression keep your pecker up (which, when British officers used it during World War II radio broadcasts to encourage Yank soldiers, was usually censored).

  Pecking order has been observed among hens, but also applies to humans and many or most species. Peckish, chiefly British, means hungry, though not ravenous. On both sides of the Atlantic, to peck at one’s food indicates one’s not very hungry.

  The name of the red-bellied woodpecker, which bears a patch of red on the back of its head and neck—hence, a redneck—was reversed into peckerwood, which became a derogatory Southern US term for a poor white person, later largely supplanted by white trash and then joined by trailer trash.

  Ever wondered why woodpeckers don’t get headaches with all that banging against trees? They not only have specially thick skulls, but those that peck most often have skulls that curve inward at the upper base of the bill, so the skull isn’t attached to the bill. The space between skull and bill is a natural shock absorber.

  Hen. . .

  Mad as a wet hen has more origin stories than some hens have eggs, but derives partly from the angry-seeming ruffling of feathers after a hen is splashed with water—something few creatures, including humans, would like—and from the cute or whimsical image of a hen upset.

  Hen refers to the female of a domestic fowl, yet hens may refer to domestic fowls of either sex, and a native hen is a female salmon, crab, or lobster. In Scotland hen is a term of endearment for a girl or woman. Of course a mother hen is very protective, while a hen with one chicken denotes a woman overly protective of her only child.

  A hen party or hen night is an all-female get-together. The term eventually gave way to pajama party, but in Britain a hen night is also the distaff equivalent of a stag party, for a woman about to get married.

  “As rare as hen’s teeth” is extremely rare.

  Hen money used to be money a woman got from selling spare eggs, then became a rather disparaging term for money women earned, somewhat equivalent to today’s chump change (or chicken feed).

  A hen harrier is a slender long-winged bird of prey of open country with nearly no resemblance to a hen. (The female is brown, the male mostly light gray.)

  Hen and chickens is the name of a houseleek or other plant that yields small flower heads or offshoots. Henbit is a dead nettle with purple flowers whose 16th-century name is via Low German or Dutch meaning hen’s bed—hoenderbeet. Henbane, as the name reveals, is poisonous, a member of the nightshade family, with sticky hairy leaves and an unpleasing aroma.

  A henhouse is specially for hens, a place that needs guarding against hungry foxes. Symbolically, a henhouse is a place housing mostly or all females, such as a girls’ dorm, that needs guarding against lustful males.

  In English we say a chicken clucks—keeping in mind that most languages have different words for the way animals supposedly sound. When a person clucks, they’re being fussy. When a person’s a cluck, they’re foolish, by association with a chicken. To emphasize this, one says someone is a dumb cluck.

  Bill or Beak

  When is it a bill and when a beak? Most ornithologists say they’re one and the same but that the correct term is bill. Beak enters the non-technical picture when the bill is larger, as with parrots, toucans, flamingos, and pelicans. (Likewise, a person with a large honker is sometimes said to have quite a beak on him, not a bill.)

  A bird’s bony bill serves, depending, as its fork, knife, food processor, or serving dish. For instance, hummingbirds use their long slim bills to probe flowers for nectar, eagles’ bills are hooked—the better to rip apart the flesh of their prey—and sparrows have tough conical bills for crushing seeds. In days of yore bills were considered avian noses, but they parallel mouths and jaws much more closely.

  An old limerick says, “A wonderful bird is the pelican. Its beak can hold more than its belican.”

  (When humans bill and coo they speak or behave in a lovingly sentimental manner. A beaked whale has extended jaws that form a beak; among them are bottlenose whales.)

  Cock and Bull Story

  During the late 1700s and early 1800s Stony Stratford was a major stop-over site for mail coaches, tradesmen, and travelers, situated as it was halfway between London and Birmingham and halfway between Oxford and Cambridge. The town’s two leading coaching inns were The Cock and The Bull, which became famous nationwide as the centers of almost all news and gossip traveling through either on foot or by horse. The rival inns began competing as to which could create the most exciting travelers’ tales to pass on to the big cities. Too many of their stories were unbelievable and came to be known as cock and bull stories.

  Cock

  A cock is a rooster or male chicken—also a male lobster, crab, or salmon. Why did the word become “vulgar slang” (as dictionaries put it) for a penis? Theories abound. Because a cock was slang for an aggressive man. Because it was a fighting bird. Because a cock (the bird) has an upright posture—but so do umpteen animals, including kangaroos, often called roos in Australia. Because a rooster is a virile symbol—but so’s a bull. Because a penis supposedly resembles a bird—a smaller one, not a male chicken. Because a man’s pubic hair purportedly resembles the ring or collar of feathers displayed by some roosters and because the wattles on turkeys and some roosters are said to resemble the scrotum. Take your pick. Or come up with your own.

  The word cock, for male bird, is of Germanic and Scandinavian origin.

  Cockney

  A Cockney is a London East Ender, traditionally born within the sound of Bow Bells. It’s also that particular accent, once shunned by British media, now almost prized. In Australia it’s a young snapper fish, and in the States it’s someone who sounds like Michael Caine. Who would guess that the original meaning, in the 1300s, was a hen’s egg? It was later used to describe a child breastfed for a longer than usual period, and then a pampered child. This led to signifying a feeble individual, which the country majority applied to the city minority, whose lifestyle they deemed less salutary than a rural one. All this by the 1600s, when Cockney took on its current sense of describing a particular species of city dweller.

  To Rule the Roost

  The allusion is now to a rooster dominating the hens in a chicken run and trying to show his authority. Originally, the phrase had more to do with beef than poultry. Shakespeare helped popularize the phrase in his play Henry VI Part II (1591): “Suffolk, that new made man that rules the roast.” This ties in with the “master” of the house carving and serving the roast meat. In 1637 Thomas Nabbes wrote in Microcosmus, “I am my lady’s cook, and king of the kitchen where I rule the roast.” In those days “roast” was pronounced with a long u-sound. In time, carving or ruling the roast metamorphosed into ruling the roost, with the same meaning.

  To come home to roost means that something negative recoils upon the person responsible for it—fowl karma, say. E.g., “His misdeeds during his first term in office cost him being reelected.”

  A rooster tail is
a spray of water thrown up behind a speedboat or surfboard, also a spray of gravel, dust, etc., thrown up behind a motor vehicle.

  Cockatrice

  This is a basilisk, a mythical reptile whose gaze or breath, take your pick, was lethal. It was hatched by a serpent from a cock’s egg. The name is from the Greek basiliskos, little king, and was thus popular with nobles claiming royal descent in heraldry, where a cockatrice was often rendered as a two-legged dragon with a cock’s head.

  A basilisk is also a long Central American lizard—the male carries a crest running from head to tail. In olden days, crests and manes (usually male features) were viewed as symbols of royalty, power, and strength. Thus in various cultures the rooster was known as the little king of the barnyard.

  Cock. . .

  Several dog breeds are named after what they were intended to hunt or help hunt. One example is the cocker spaniel, whose ancestors were used to flush game birds like the woodcock from their cover.

  Cockalorum is a dated term for an arrogant male, based on cock, as is the similar cock o’ the walk. Cock-of-the-rock, however, is a tropical South American bird, a crested cotinga, the male of which sports bright red or orange plumage. (A major reason female birds are less colorfully eye-catching than males is their greater vulnerability to predators while sitting in the nest.)

  Though cocky now denotes conceited, confident, or arrogant (as does cocksure), its 16th-century meaning was lecherous, via the horny rooster.

  In Australia, cocky is the preferred term for cockatoo, a parrot with an erectile crest native to that land. Also native, crested, and related is the cockatiel, with a primarily gray body and orange and yellow face.

  Some cocks have nothing to do with roosters. For instance a cock or small pile of hay may be of Scandinavian origin.

  Cock- is a frequent prefix, not always fowl-related (e.g., cockroach is from the Spanish cucaracha, and cockamamie, now meaning ridiculous, had to do with decal-type designs).