My Dad used to often quip "Now you're cookin' with gas" when one of us kids had figured out how to do a job properly.

Well, I have cooked on a wood fired range/oven and I understand the advantage of a gas stove. But I bet that those of us who do are probably less than 1 in 50,000.

We had one, hated the damn thing.

"You get what you pay for."

"Better than sliced bread"

"A flash in the pan"

“Cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey”

My dad & grandad had a bunch of them. I wish that I could remember all of them.

Picking in tall cotton

Farting through silk shorts

Dumber than a peach orchard bore. (never did get that one)

One brick short of a full load

Bruce

Dumber than owl sheet.
That dog 'll hunt.
Smoke 'em if ya got 'em.
Eating high off the hog.

Between the Devil and the deep blue sea.

Stop jacking off or you'll go blind.

Pfffft!!!

"It ain't the biggest dog in the fight, it's the biggest fight in the dog."


L.W.

Dumber than a peach orchard Boar? Boar not bore perhaps?


Dumb because of the rotten fermenting peaches?


So maybe it was like saying dumber than a drunk pig?

My range oven/stove top has been gas for fifteen years. Much better for cooking.

No such thing as a free lunch...

Democrast = The party that supports the working man.

Colder than a witches titty

Aint that the truth

Can't roller skate in a buffalo herd?

The one I never liked 'cause it was usually after a whoopin':


"Now, how do you like those apples"

I bet this still applies to some of the folks here on Sat/Sun/Mon mornings?

"Shakin' like a dog crappin peach pits"

Lots more when i can think of them.

That's a fine kettle of fish.

Only takes one rotten apple to ruin the barrel. (When was the last time anyone saw a barrel of apples?)

Geno

"Your mama sure does care bout your schoolin, son"

That's the first level of cold, the next is.......

Colder than a witches tit in a brass bra....................

I suspect the automated censor will prevent me from saying the phrase here, but I've always liked what the former First Brother said about woodpiles. Seems to have fallen out of favor...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/arch...ke/da0cb329-0465-4c39-b931-cc0713b59ed1/

Having a 2 second fuse in a 3 second cook-off.
( An old Tarawa Marine, and friend of our family used to say that one. )

“Pissing like a Missouri mule on a flat-smooth white washed river rock!”

Well, only if cast iron is used exclusively. (Of course, that includes all spatulas and other utensils.)

I think that one saying goes, " like a pee (piss) tortured boar". Not being a farmer nor a hog raiser, I never did understand the correlation either, but have heard the expression most of my 66 year life. If anyone here knows the correct answer, please share with us!! Russ

" her mouth goes like a whippoorwills azz"

Mis-hearing of "worthless as teats on a boar!" ???

Bruce

The next is "colder than a tin toilet in an igloo"


mike r

"all men are created equal"



mike r

'Thats as good as honey on a bisquit"

Deader'n Kelsey's nuts.

I ll beat you like a rented mule.

i've seen more than one boar hog with his cork screw hanging out all swelled up, infected or something only able to dribble.

If Aunt Lena has nuts she would be Uncle Ollie. Ed k

Lots of confusion of this phrase, it relates to the drop in temperature that would cause steel canon balls to topple from a pyramid shape from stacking them on a base of brass that had holes holding the bottom layer of canon balls on what was referred to as a “brass monkey”

Sticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me.


Leftist PC culture has turned that into "words are violence and must be met with physical violence."

Nuttier than squirrel sheet

Here in west central Florida it's:

Rainin like a two-tailed cow pizzen on a flat rock......

"shakin' like a dog schitting peach pits"

Yes, I heard that a few times on Monday morn when the welder thought I was not running my cutting torch quite as straight as usual.

Mom used to tell us:

"We're going to be makin' a three legged hop to the hospital"

"What"

"To extract my boot from your ass."

My old girlfriend would say. " Sticks and stones may break my bones, but whip's and chains excite me! " Dad always told me , " Don't let your mouth write checks, your ass can't cash!

You didn't get it because you spelled it incorrectly.
It's "boar".



Wild boars would eat fermented peaches off the ground and get stupid drunk.

"Dumber than a peach orchard BOAR"

Colder than a witches tit on a well diggers behind.

He is a couple of cards short of a full deck.

The light is on but no one is home.

Their heart is colder than ice.

Phuqed up as a football bat

Like a red headed black basturd stepchild

He's so big he can stand flatfooted and siht in a dumptruck!

Keep your nose to the grindstone
Make hay while the sun shines
Drop a dime
Dial a number
family dinner
Respect is earned, not given
Madder than a wet hen
Let sleeping dogs lie
Don't let the bedbugs bite
When it's springtime in Alaska its forty below
Mrs Pedicaris, you are an awful lot of trouble (yes, I know the real story)

Some of these are still relevant and used regularly

"Don't put the cart in front of the horse"

"Steeper than a cow's face"

The snow, creek, brush, etc.. is-"Azz-deep on a tall Indian"

"Stay on the green-side of the grass."

More than Carter has pills.

It is boar, and yes a drunk boar acting stupid

And the myth continues...

No such thing as a brass monkey used on ships

Cannon balls were not stored on deck for various reasons - deck space needed for other uses, balls were "babied" in order to fly true, in heavy seas, balls would be all over the gun deck, breaking limbs etc...

Thermal expansion rate difference between brass and cast iron not significant enough cause balls to "topple" from a brass base. Look up the coeficients yourself, but a 100 degree temperature swing (say from 70 to -30 degrees) would only have the balls expand .0007" more per inch of diameter than the brass plate. Over 48", that turns out to be all of .033". No stinking way that small amount of difference would have an effect on a pyramidal stack.

From the Navy:

https://www.history.navy.mil/resear...-list-alphabetically/b/brass-monkey.html

Bruce

Best answer so far

Colder than a well diggers ass,

Educated well beyond his intelligence.

He shore do like the sound of his own voice.

Skeeters so big, one could stand flat footed and rape a turkey.

Skeeters so big they had to get a running start to take off.

If you were half as smart as you think you are, you'd be twice as smart as you really are.

He doesn't have two nickels to rub together.

The mosquitos in Louisiana can stand flat footed and whip a bantam rooster.

To tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help me God.

Around here its colder than a well digger's ass in Montana.....which we use to describe temps in the upper 20's low 30's.

As useful as a fart in a whirlwind.
Sweep your house before your porch.

Had a friend when I was a young kid who's father would say "it's hotter than a lizard's ass walking across the desert. "

Dumber than a box of rocks. Edk

+1

This is a puzzling thread to me, because most of the sayings posted are as relevant today as ever. A better thread title might be: Forgotten Maxims and old sayings not understood today.

Many of these sayings are not known by modern urban folks, people whose real world education is so limited that they have never heard them in the first place. So they may be irrelevant in terms of being understood by people with limited reference, but the proverb is as relevant and true as ever.

I.e. Eating high on the hog will be relevant till hogs change their anatomy! A box of rocks will always be dumb. Carter's pills: OK, that one has become virtually irrelevant!

Frog it Daddy!

What a sack full of [bleep].

If it was up your ass you would know

Dryer than a popcorn fart.

Half a bubble off plumb. Hornier than a 2 pecker'd billy goat. Happier than a puppy with 2 peters. I'd be on it like a pit bull on a poodle.

Okanagan, it was predictable that the Fire's reading comprehension expired after "Old Maxims." Most of the posters got no further, or were unable to comprehend what "are no longer relevant" meant.

I’d like to buy him for what he’s worth and sell him for what he thinks he’s worth

Was gonna throw a smart arsed reply but yeah....you do have a point. Like when someone gets two pages of scope recommendations other than the particular one he mentioned?

So...thinking this should qualify - " Lord willing and the Creek don't rise."

Pretty sure they won't.

Yes, some still relevant.

couple I think Lonnie posted, not so much. Most folks don't know much about carts and horses. Perhaps today's version would be :

Don't put the camp trailer in front of the F 250

Still useful and understood?

F'd up like a soup sammich

I got all my scheidt in one sock.

Ruralites will still understand this one:

Went to have a crap and the hogs ate him.

Geno

Bet you dollars to doughnuts... this can still be used, just in reverse. Doughnuts where I'm at cost over a dollar now. Unless this was a bet with the gingerbread man.

Crookeder than a dogs hind leg...

He'd steal the pennies off a dead man's eyes....

wonder does anyone really know what '...and the creek don't rise...' was really talking about?????

This is one of the 'OLD' maxims that have no use today!

Took longer than a seven year itch. Does that count? I really enjoy reading these threads about old sayings. A lot I’ve heard from the older people I was around when I was a kid. Brings back good memories.

raining like a 2 cocked cow pissing on a flat rock

The lord will make it rain but it’s up to you to put the seed in the ground.

It had nothing to do with water, it was about the Creek (Muskogee) Indians not going on the warpath.

Yep!

"That's like trying to find a needle in a haystack."

How many people today actually know what a haystack is?

L.W.

Then how about ;
'Don't hurt yourself getting down off that high horse' ?

My grandpa used to say....”more fun than a barrel of monkeys”.

“Now you’re cooking with gas” is another one that I remember.

There were so many that my mind is spinning. 😁

Drier than an old nun.

Worse than a sore ass in fly time.

Lock, stock and barrel...

Lower than whale schitt.

Not worth a tinker's damn

Ain't got two nickels to rub together

Not worth a red cent

Don't take any wooden nickels

Fux like a mink

You all have a lot of the bases covered. One that may have been missed or was in my family only -

“Children are to be seen and not heard!” My pop would tell all 7 of us, when we were formally entertaining neighbors, or his Pop. He said he got that one from him, his Pop. In relation to same with his 6 siblings.

Enter millennials...

Or like a squirrel .

What’s good for the goose is good for the gander

It takes two to tango

Robbing Peter to pay Paul

Haste makes waste

Bird in hand is better than two in the bush

Sadly, all of these and many more should still be entirely relevant.

Then there was that saying about "The Whole Nine Yards" , meaning all of something or the entirety of it all....... I can recall using that myself many years ago but never knew where it originated. Then an old guy told me it was a reference to the length of the ammo belt for the machine guns on a WW2 fighter plane, ( don't recall which one), If a plane came back out of ammo it was said he did the whole nine yards. Sounds plausible to me unless he was pulling my leg.

The South will rise again.

You can lead a horse to water.................

Hotter than a fresh fugged fox in a forest fire
Hotter than the hinges of he'll
Fugged up as a mill rat
You been all morning combing your hair ?
Feel like a sack full of arseholes without the sack
You would have to tie a 2x4 across your arse to keep from falling in
Hotter than a two dollar pistol
Queer as a three dollar bill
If there was as many sticking out as there have been stuck in she would look like a porcupine
Shaved her legs to those on
He climbs like a monkey fuggin a football

Grandpa would tell folks, you're gonna break your arm patting yourself on the back.

I always liked "Queer as a three dollar bill" when my dad said it. I changed it to "Gayer than a three dollar bill" in my teens. Still make that comment regularly.

“(Enter distance); As the crow flies...”

“Can’t get theyahh from heyuhh” (Maine folks only)

Oh yeah.

That was a religion in our house hold when I was a kid. We were welcome to sit around and listen to the adults discuss matters of weight in world affairs. But we sure as hell did not open our mouth.

The Whole Nine Yards.



L.W.

Kids today wouldn’t have a clue what this one means

If someone was poor, or having a hard time in their life, GrandMa would day:

“He’s got a tough row to hoe”

If I agreed with you we’d both be wrong!

And one of GrandDad’s favorites:

“He’s so dumb he couldn’t poor piss out of a boot with directions on the bottom”

My uncle used to quote, every time "Old Barny" blew a load of gas toward the front of the feed wagon
"A fartin' horse never tires, and a tired horse never farts."

And of course, every time Auntie complained about the cowy smell coming from our boots in the mudroom
"Smells like money".

And there were a few he told me about women, they are as relevant today as they have been for ten thousand years.

'Never step through the doorway of a married woman's house unless her husband is home."

"If she will leave him for you, she will leave you for the next one."

Oh and one other,
"Better to have peder tracks on your zipper, than zipper tracks on your peder."
I was always afraid to ask for an interpretation of that last one. I figured it had to do with his family's recent immigration from Switzerland.

TheCreek Indians.....

Uncle Ernie used to say, “A fartin’ horse will never tire, a fartin’ man’s the one to hire.”

How about, “Crazier than a schitt house rat.”

Hotter than a two-peckered goat......

too poor to pay attention..

couldn't buy a low cut dress for a piss ant if cotton was 5 cents a bale.

frozen harder than chinese algebra.

‘That guy wouldn’t know heads from tails’
They were talking about making cuts on moonshine — not coins

Grinning like a fox biting yellow jackets.

Slicker than snot on a 'nanner.

Boy Howdy

My maternal grandmother was fond of saying " That's a doozy", to signify something special or exceptional. I later learned that the phrase came from the 1920's and 30's when Duesenberg cars were some of America's most expensive and prestigious automobiles and were sometimes nicknamed "Doozies" ; so "Doozy" became slang for something very special, or exceptional, or expensive.

Here too, My dad used to say "a fartin mule will never tire, and a fartin man is the man to hire"

Thank you. I was trying to play by the rules of the OP.

Aw hell, who cares about how relevant they are today today. They're funny. And have generated 6 pages of posts too.

Yer noisier than two skeletons [bleep] on a tin roof.


Yer phuggee up as a football bat.

I thought it was for the 50s on a B-17 but you guys could easily have it right, for a fighter.