Etymology 101: origin of phrases and words.

The year is 2025. We are sitting in an advanced English class at New Mexico State University. The class of 1760 students is listening to the gray haired professor, standing far down in the theater, droning on and on and on:

“Class, you have been studying origins of English sayings. We now have a doctoral presentation on one of the most interesting and intriguing language developments in modern times. First presenter, “You are on:”

The chief assistant graduate student stands to make his presentation:

“Ladies and Gentlemen: after 12 years of exhaustive research, we have discovered why in the early 21st century there was a broad based resurgence of old epithets, clichés, and exclamations. A wide sampling of these phrases is:

“Great Gawd Almighty, never seen that before.”

“Stop or we’ll all be killed.”

“Help, I ate too much and can’t get up.”

“Holy Cow, can you believe they did that?!”

“It’s a bird; It’s a plane; It’s a chair!”

“I can’t hear myself think!”

“Twas a phenomenal phenomenon.”

“My team requested and received a grant for 13 million dollars from the federal government to find out what happened. After 10 years of research, numerous interviews and studies around the country, we found that the resurgence of all these sayings had a common origin,” his practiced speech trails off.

The class waits. Finally the exasperated professor loudly queries:
“Well what started all this strange old fashioned talk?”

The grad student replies: “Sir, it was all from one group of people that survived a Jewish wedding on Long Island in 2005! They returned to their homes all over the country and told wild stories of that wedding to everyone!”

There is a long silence. One local young undergraduate (named E.J.) stands tall and shouts: “Yup, I was there. All the wild stories are true. Nuff said.”