Words and their stories, deep six

Source: http://www.voanews.com/learningenglish/home/words-stories/Words-and-Their-Stories-Deep-Six-117460228.html

Now, the VOA Special English program WORDS AND THEIR STORIES.

Sailors seem -- to those of us on land -- to lead exciting, even mysterious lives. Many things are different at sea. Even the language is different.

Simple words like "right" and "left" are not the same. On a ship, "right" is "starboard." And "left" is "port."

Sailors are responsible for many colorful English expressions.

One of these is deep-six. It means to hide something or put it where it will not be found. You can also deep-six, or reject a proposal.

One language expert says that deep six is the bottom of the ocean. "Deep," in this case, means deepest. The "six" in the expression comes from the six feet that make up a fathom -- which is a little less than two meters.

Sailors measure the depth of the water in fathoms. Thus, the deep six is the deepest fathom...the final six feet at the bottom of the ocean.  A sailor who never wants to see something again will give it the deep-six. He will drop it from the ship to the ocean bottom.

You can deep-six something even if you are not a sailor. All you do is throw it away or put it where it will never be found. You might, for example, deep-six an unplesant letter from a former friend.

Another expression linked to sailing is batten down the hatches. That is what sailors do to prepare their ship for a storm at sea.

Battens are thin pieces of wood. Hatches are the openings in the deck. Before a storm, sailors cover the hatches with waterproof material. Then they nail on battens to hold the hatch coverings firmly in place. This keeps rain and waves out of the ship.

Now, people use the expression to mean to prepare for dealing with any kind of trouble.

A news report, for example, might say that people in Washington were battening down the hatches for a big winter storm. Or a newspaper might report that "defense lawyers were 'battening down the hatches' for testimony by someone who observed the crime."

An old expression of the sailors that is still heard is to sail under false colors. Experts on language say the expression was born more than two hundred fifty years ago, when pirates sailed the seas, attacking and robbing trade ships.

Pirate ships often flew the flag of a friendly country as they sailed toward the ship they planned to rob.They sailed under false colors until they were close enough to attack. Then the pirates pulled down the false flag, and showed their true colors. They raised the pirate flag -- with its picture of a skull and crossed bones.

Today, a person, not a ship, is said to sail under false colors. Such a person appears to be something he is not. His purpose is to get something from you. If you are careful, you will soon see his true colors, and have nothing to do with him.

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This VOA Special English program, WORDS AND THEIR STORIES, was written by Marilyn Christiano. This is Warren Scheer.

Words and their stories, food expressions, part II

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Source: www.voanews.com 

Now, the VOA Special English program WORDS AND THEIR STORIES. We received a list of expressions about food from Elenir Scardueli, a listener from Brazil.

Today we will talk about some good things to eat. If something is new and improved, we say it is the best thing since sliced bread. In the past, bread was only sold in loaves in baked goods stores. Today, American supermarkets sell sliced bread in plastic bags. Many people thought this was easier because you did not have to cut the bread yourself. The person who makes the most money in a family is called the breadwinner.

Bread and butter issues are those that are most important to Americans and affect them directly – like jobs and health care.

Half a loaf is better than none means that getting part of what you want is better than getting nothing at all. If you know which side your bread is buttered on, then you know what your best interests are and will act to protect them.

Many Americans like their bread toasted. Toast is cooked with dry heat until it starts to turn brown. But you are in big trouble if someone tells you you’re toast.

If you say something is a piece of cake, it means something is really easy, like a test you take in school. Cakes are often covered with a sweet topping, called icing. Icing on the cake means something good that happens in addition to another good thing. Another expression says you can’t have your cake and eat it, too. This means you cannot have everything your way, especially if two wishes oppose each other.

Hotcakes are also called pancakes. They contain flour, eggs, milk and baking powder. You cook them in a frying pan and eat them with fruit or a sweet topping.  If a new product is popular and selling well, you might say it isselling like hotcakes.

But if a friend of yours did something bad, you might stop being friends with him immediately or drop him like a hotcake.

Flat as a pancake describes something that is, well, really flat.

A tough cookie is not something you want to eat. It is a person who is difficult to deal with, and would do anything necessary to get what he or she wants. This person could be a sharp cookie or someone who is not easily fooled. Very often things do not go the way we planned. Instead of getting angry or sad, you might just accept it and say that’s the way the cookie crumbles.

Many pies are also good to eat. If something is easy to do, you could say it iseasy as pie. But if you do something wrong or bad, you might have to apologize and show you are sorry. In other words, you might have to eat humble pie.

If you have an idea or plan that is not really possible, someone might say it ispie in the sky. If something is really easy to do, you might say it is liketaking candy from a baby. But that would not be a very nice thing to do!

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This program was written by Shelley Gollust. I'm Faith Lapidus. You can find more WORDS AND THEIR STORIES at our website, voaspecialenglish.com.