"They
�ll be shootin � the breeze �til the cows come home."
Many people imagine that this is an idioglottic, idiosyncratic,
idiomatic expression, but they are all wrong!
And it is certainly not idiotic.
On seeing this phrase, I turned to my Vade Mecum for
inspiration. I call it my �Vade Mecum�
because I take it everywhere with me. (�Vade Mecum� means �Go with me� in Latin.) I would have preferred the title to have been
in Greek, because Greek impresses people who look over your shoulder much more
than Latin does. However, the Romans
spoke Latin, not Greek, as you possibly know, so my book is titled �Vade Mecum�.
Nevertheless, as the Catholic priest said, observing the
numerous children of the Murphy family in his tiny congregation, �we must be thankful
for small Murphys�.
I opened my Vade Mecum, �Answers to �Word of the Day� Problems�,
by Jason Rayne Bowes. You will be astonished,
as I was, when I saw the words on page 1,897 of Volume 6. There, at Chapter 14, �Who Killed Cock Robin?�
by Howard I Noe, was the ominous sentence: �Most so-called idiomatic expressions
originated in Switzerland!�
I have no intention of boring you with puerile,
infantile, juvenile jokes about Switzerland.
�What is the most complicated piece of army equipment in Switzerland?� �The Swiss army knife�.
�How do you make a Swiss Roll?� �Push him down a hillside!�
�In Switzerland, what is National Service?� �Two years at Neutral School.�
However, here is a Swiss yodelling joke.
A Swiss commercial traveller went from mountain to
mountain, selling farm equipment to isolated farms. While the farmer worked in the fields, the
traveller spent the day explaining the equipment to the wife and her beautiful
daughter. In the evening, the farmer
returned, to find that his daughter had been kissed by the visitor.
Furious, he shouted across the valley at the
commercial traveller, on the adjoining hillside.
�You swine!
You take advantage of my hospitality by kissing my daughter!�
Back came the reply.
��And your old laydee, too!�
�
It is not generally known that the British group, The
Beatles, had a successful tour of Switzerland, organised by an extremely polite,
German-speaking Manager, Dan Kershern.
Their most popular song was translated for them by Tristan Schaut.
And it is thus that we arrive at a full explanation
of the perfectly straightforward phrase: "They
�ll be shootin � the breeze �til the cows come home."
A group of Swiss farmers emigrated to the USA. One of them took a grandfather clock with
him, to remind him of home. As he
carried the clock onto the quayside, an American dock-worker asked: �Why
can�t you use a wrist-watch, like everybody else?�
Naturally,
the Swiss became cowboys, but they refused to use their guns as offensive
weapons. Instead, they simply shot them
into the air, while waiting for the cows, wearing cow-bells, (�Kuhglocken�), to
come home,. The Swiss called to the cows
on their Alphorns, by playing �Ranz des Vaches�. This aria is from the American opera, �Bill, Explain!� by Ross Eeny. It was eventually translated into the German,
�William, Tell�, by Barbara
Seville.
Hence, we
have the expression:
"They
�ll be shootin � the breeze �til the cows come home."
Les
