Re: Fill In The Blank

1

Was this some kind of deal where we get pwned just by reading the whole post?

I feel tricked.


Posted by: Joe Drymala | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 2:33 PM
horizontal rule
2

There's also the slightly less offensive, "ghetto rigged."


Posted by: Michael | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 2:33 PM
horizontal rule
3

Or the equally offensive "afro rigged."


Posted by: Michael | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 2:34 PM
horizontal rule
4

I was under the impression that jerry-rigged was an anti-German expression dating back to one of them there WWs.


Posted by: apostropher | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 2:37 PM
horizontal rule
5

I must really be dense today. I've only heard of "jury rig" and assumed it was common knowledge. Where did "Jerry rigged" come from, WWII?


Posted by: Tripp | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 2:38 PM
horizontal rule
6

That's addressed at the bottom of the linked page, apo.


Posted by: ogged | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 2:38 PM
horizontal rule
7

Along similar lines, and perhaps even less useful as knowledge, note the relations between Heath Robinson and Rube Goldberg contraptions.


Posted by: slolernr | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 2:40 PM
horizontal rule
8

I was under the impression that jerry-rigged was an anti-German expression dating back to one of them there WWs.

I think that I shall never see

A volker etymology.


Posted by: Joycepipe Kilmerplate | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 2:43 PM
horizontal rule
9

Where they say, basically, they have no clue about where it comes from. Damned etymologists.


Posted by: Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 2:43 PM
horizontal rule
10

Ah, but they know where it does not come from. And isn't that really all you need to know to play the grammar pest?


Posted by: slolernr | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 2:46 PM
horizontal rule
11

Jury-rigged is correct -- it's a sailing term, or at least I've seen it primarily in that context, meaning improvised. 'Jerry-built' is a term meaning shoddily built, I think from WW II England, with Jerries=Germans. The 'Jerry' from the latter term has drifted into the earlier term because of the similarity in sound and meaning, but ''jerry-built is a malapropism, rather than a different term in its own right.


Posted by: LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 2:56 PM
horizontal rule
12

Whoops -- somehow I missed the whole post, which says all of those things.


Posted by: LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 2:57 PM
horizontal rule
13

Except that apparently "jerry" isn't about the Germans.


Posted by: ogged | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 2:59 PM
horizontal rule
14

a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=jerry-built">This page traces "jerry" back to "jury." Seems like they're all just guessing.


Posted by: Tia | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 3:04 PM
horizontal rule
15

Methinks "jerry-built" is by now an equally acceptable alternative rather than a malapropism. Anyone who wants to argue about the hyphen, step outside.


Posted by: Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 3:04 PM
horizontal rule
16

damn hyperlinks.


Posted by: Tia | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 3:05 PM
horizontal rule
17

Just remember, Tia, the alligators have to be eating the quotes on both sides.


Posted by: Joe Drymala | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 3:06 PM
horizontal rule
18

Fuck to oboe, I meant that "jerry-rigged" is now equally acceptable. And it's all LizardBreath's fault. Truly, white women are responsible for the majority of wickedness that goes on across the globe.


Posted by: Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 3:07 PM
horizontal rule
19

So do the quotes have to shave?


Posted by: Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 3:08 PM
horizontal rule
20

This is all very confusing. Perhaps we should just stick with nigger-rigged since I can pinpoint exactly where that originates.


Posted by: apostropher | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 3:08 PM
horizontal rule
21

So do the quotes have to shave?

If they're being eaten on both sides, they have to shave and bleach.


Posted by: Tia | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 3:17 PM
horizontal rule
22

Apropo of nothing, my father works for an international plating-supplies company, and when the German employees were over to tour various plants and share experiences, they used the term "nigger-rig". And were quite surprised at being asked not to do so.


Posted by: Camera Obscura | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 3:35 PM
horizontal rule
23

William Safire had a column on this any number of years ago.


Posted by: ben w-lfs-n | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 4:16 PM
horizontal rule
24

*sob*


Posted by: Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 4:17 PM
horizontal rule
25

shoddily put together out of chintzy materials.

Even more amusing (to some twisted people) is that both shoddy and chintz began their word-lives as fabrics.


Posted by: TJ | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 4:24 PM
horizontal rule
26

Leave it to w-lfs-n to have an encyclopedic knowledge of Safire columns.

My two cents' worth would be to note that I had a rather offensive college roommate who associated anything shoddy with Jews. So cheap tape was Jew tape. He came from the vast trailer park that is Greenwich, Connecticut, in case you wonder.


Posted by: peter snees | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 5:04 PM
horizontal rule
27

Wow.


Posted by: ogged | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 5:08 PM
horizontal rule
28

An acquaintence of mine at college would do the same sort of thing, when playing monopoly (it was a drinking game, we weren't that dorky...i hope) he would say he was "jewing up" every time someone landed on his hotel or something. He thought it was hilarious, we all cringed and took solace in the fact that no one really liked him.


Posted by: Matt F | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 5:15 PM
horizontal rule
29

Oddly enough, my erstwhile roommate was quite a popular guy on the campus of my Catholic college, once described by Newsweek as the "cradle of the Catholic Left." But that was the Reagan era, baby, and racism was back.


Posted by: peter snees | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 5:25 PM
horizontal rule
30

Catholics? Antisemitic?

I can't believe it; I thought they were all heterosexual. Didn't the Pope decide that?


Posted by: John Emerson | Link to this comment | 09-23-05 6:41 PM
horizontal rule