martha said:

Hi, Mary Clare — What WAS my example? I forget.

I noticed this, too. Martha's example was a statement in the form of "I wonder who said, "Blood is thicker than water." I would have thought that the proper place for the question mark was nowhere, although a question is implied. Had she said, "Who said "Blood is thicker than water"?" the question mark would go outside of the quote, (and inside the quoted quote . . .)

By the way, am I supposed to use a comma in ". . . she said, "Who …", or are such commas becoming obsolete?

LeoKulonosen said:

I am so glad you brought up this euphemism. I had never heard this until I was in my twenties. I first heard it from my boss who was a recent immigrant from Ireland. In fact from county Cork near Limerick. I was glad to hear you reinforce the notion that the expression comes from Ireland. Though I guess it doesn't really matter other than when you hear, “I'm going to see a man about a horse” or the even more common “I need to see a man about a horse” you hear a very lilting rapid fire phrase “see a man about a horse”.
When you pointed out that there was an older saying about a dog, it only reinforces the argument that it is the rhythm of the phrase that is important. It is a pity when you read these words, you cannot hear them spoken. It is like reading Oscar Wilde aloud. It is better done with a Limerick accent.

My father used to say that he was "going to see a man about a mule." I rather prefer the alliteration of that one.

I've also heard "drain the lizard," and "drain the tanks." In our household, we use the term "drain the dogs" to mean that we are going to take the dogs out for a pee.

As for that pesky comma and quote thing – when type was handset bits of lead, you could snuggle the quotes up to the commas and they didn't look so awkward, but when desktop publishing came along, and commas had to have a vertical space to the top of the line, they started to look weird. ," would look better correctly kerned.

I lived in Nottingham for a while and the expression there was " I'm going to turn me bike around" which I think referred to the fact that the privy was in the back yard and that's where the bike would be parked. also, maybe co-incidentally, the big employer in Nottingham was "the Raleigh" bike factory.

Alan Brown

Is there anyway to get a list of the songs used in the episode? Specifically the one played at 26:30? That has a nice groove that I would like to dance to.

Thanks I appreciate that. You all use some great songs. I don't know how much of an inconvenience it would be, but going forward, maybe a quick listing of what was used could be put in the show notes?