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What family sayings did you think was universal? (infosec.pub)

submitted 4 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

57 comments fedilink hide all child comments

cross-posted from: https://infosec.pub/post/14650446

As I was growing up, my family had a couple of sayings I took for granted were universal, at least within my language. As I became an adult I have learned that these are not universal at all:

the ketchup effect. It is an expression meaning that when things arrive, they all arrive at the same time. Think of an old school glass ketchup bottle. When you hit the bottom of it, first there is nothing, then there is nothing and then the entire content is on your food.

faster than Jesus slid down the mount of olives. Basically a saying that implies that the mount of olives is slippery due to olive oil and Jesus slipped.

What you lack in memory, your legs suffer. An expression meaning that when you are forgetful, you usually need to run back and thus your legs suffer.

Please share your own weird family sayings.

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[–] [email protected] 7 points 4 months ago (2 children)

Plenty people in my family refer to cat kneading, in Portuguese, as "dancinha do leite" (milk dance). And I always took it as if it was as universal as "amassar pãozinho" (to knead bread). Well, it isn't; I discovered this in my adulthood. Apparently it's from Italian.

There's also bunch of references to someone making things worse as "batata verde" (green potato); like "xô, vá ser batata verde noutro canto" (shoo, go be a green potato elsewhere) or "[pessoa] é uma batata verde" ([person] is a green potato). I get the reasoning, but no idea where my family got this from.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago

I'm going to start using green potatoe, thank you.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Cats make biscuits!

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

If that was the case my cats are always overworking the dough. Specially when one of them sits on my lap to watch a video, she spends at least half a hour with "prrr prr [knead knead] [headbutt] prrr prr". (She already got that my computer screen shows stuff like birds, mice and strings, but only if I'm nearby.)