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Me Dads old sayings

When it was bed time, my Dad would say something that sounded like" 'op it off ta kip!" I always wondered if it was Welsh, but now I see that my Joneses were all Brummies.
 
One I remember was " Put wood in hole" (shut the door). And if the door was left open we usually got "Were you born in a barn?" Viv.
 
My old man was normally a stern old bugger, but on occasion he could make us laugh. If he saw a job that needed doing, or something that needed attention, he'd say "A quick coat of clartnent will fix that!". He never actually told us what clartnent was, but years ago a friend of mine from Yorkshire happened to mention that when he was a nipper his dad referred to creosote as 'clart'. Weird, or what? God alone knows where my old man picked it up.

Big Gee
 
My dad used to say when someone was upset he'd say, Don't worry about them they're a bit 'cut up'. He was working on our verandah one day and said to me, 'Hold that ladder , son, if it moves I'll be be a bit cut up and so will you when I recover.' Regards, David.
 
One of his most provocative saying was "The Lord did a wonderful job when he made woman, then he went and spoilt it by giving them a tongue" Oh Dear!!
Bernard
 
my old man used to say when we were always squabling amongest ourselves in the house ; shut up and be quite; OR ELSE YOU ;
BOBS YOUR UNCLE; AND FANNYS YOUR AUNT END IT NOW OR OTHERWISE YOU WILL BE UP THOSE DANCERS ;FASTER THAN YOU THINK ;
WHAT HE REALLY MEANT WAS YOU WILL UP TO BED AND NO TEA ; Thats is way of ruling ; but mom always called us down when he went to work
or to the pub ; but more often than not he had a idea that she was doing that so he used to double back and catch her out ;
he over ruled her and said joyce ; i meanwhat i say and shouted at her astonian;;
 
Aidan said:
I think you may be right there JohnO. But where did Collars & Cuffs come in? That's one I've never understood the origin of.
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- I think y'all realisethat I'm just back to this site (big grin!) Collars and cuffs, I think, come from the days when these were removable starched items.... and then translates to "White collar workers" workers in later years - am I correct??
 
In our family, my Dad especially, would call anyone doing something silly, stupid or pretentious a "Sillyoldrakkamdibs". I heard it a lot growing up in the 60s and into the early 70s. Much later I reminded my Mom of the word - she told me it was "Silly Old Rackhams Dibs" named after the up-market, posh department store (dating back to 1800s). Apparently, Rackhams had a policy that any stock not sold after their January sales was put into a big room and all the staff were allowed to go in and choose one item for free. It would be by seniority - so the head staff and department heads would have "first dibs" - It led to some staff getting items that would normally be well out of their price range and social standing - shop girls with fur coats and porters with grand pianos - hence anything pretentious and impractical. A few of our family worked in retail in the city centre, so the word may have been only of very limited use amongst that department store "set". Has anyone else ever heard it?
 
Dinger said:
In our family, my Dad especially, would call anyone doing something silly, stupid or pretentious a "Sillyoldrakkamdibs". I heard it a lot growing up in the 60s and into the early 70s. Much later I reminded my Mom of the word - she told me it was "Silly Old Rackhams Dibs" named after the up-market, posh department store (dating back to 1800s). Apparently, Rackhams had a policy that any stock not sold after their January sales was put into a big room and all the staff were allowed to go in and choose one item for free. It would be by seniority - so the head staff and department heads would have "first dibs" - It led to some staff getting items that would normally be well out of their price range and social standing - shop girls with fur coats and porters with grand pianos - hence anything pretentious and impractical. A few of our family worked in retail in the city centre, so the word may have been only of very limited use amongst that department store "set". Has anyone else ever heard it?
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Not heard about that Dinger, but that is a pretty good way to motivate folks! And never heard that word or close to it!
 
I can remember, when asking my Dad what he was doing, the reply would be: “making wigwams for mustard mills”

I never really got to the bottom of that one!
 
rosie said:
It certainly didn't happen when I worked at Rackhams for a few months!!
rosie.
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This is all second-hand, I never worked there myself. My understanding is that it happened once a year after the January sales, certainly into the early 1950s. It probably changed either when the stores were taken over by Harrods in 1955 or House of Fraser in 1959. However, I think some vestige of the "Dibs" system continued for some staff ; maybe not actually getting stuff for free but bidding for it at a knock-down price. I seem to remember my mom (who worked at Rachams for a while in the 60s) saying that some staff would remove some highly desirable stuff they wanted from display during the sales so they could get it in "the dibs". Rackhams had a policy of not "selling on" their old stock. They didn't want people buying the more exclusive Rackham's goods elsewhere. If it wasn't sold in the sales or picked out in the "dibs" then the exclusive "Rackhams-only" stock was destroyed! I do remember another relative who worked at Rackhams, telling me he had to spend days in a stock room with a sledgehammer! That was a bit later, in the 1970s.
 
A face as long as Livery Street was a favourite of my Grans. Also -They ll end up in the Rowtin House. I discovered only fairly recently that this was the Rowton House, an establishment for anyone down on their luck.
 
My Nan often called the music that I played around 50-odd years ago a "tow row" albeit with a big smile and Dad used the same phrase too. :)
 
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