Phrases or bits of advice that have floated around in your mind for years.

[a bald avuncular jew]

I got to thinking today about a phrase that has been floating around in my head for a couple of years now, and was trying to work out why that was.  Was it just satisfyingly expressed...did it strike a chord with me and lead to a slow change of attitude over the years...did it just tickle me because it could be seen as arrogance...was there more to it than I initially realised?  All or any of these things could be true.  So, are there any little phrases or bits of advice that have stuck with you for a long time, and do you know why this is?  I'm sure there will be some funny suggestions, but I'm more interested in the insightful or personal (rather than just cliched things that we all have probably heard before.)

[5 Knuckle Shuffle]

I got to thinking today about a phrase that has been floating around in my head for a couple of years now, and was trying to work out why that was.  Was it just satisfyingly expressed...did it strike a chord with me and lead to a slow change of attitude over the years...did it just tickle me because it could be seen as arrogance...was there more to it than I initially realised?  All or any of these things could be true.  So, are there any little phrases or bits of advice that have stuck with you for a long time, and do you know why this is?  I'm sure there will be some funny suggestions, but I'm more interested in the insightful or personal (rather than just cliched things that we all have probably heard before.)

Er, twenty on a wet day.

[Almost Yearly]

I've been thinking a lot lately about the little philosophical phrases which slip out through a parent's lips and deep into the life-script of their children. Whenever I said something a bit sparky as a nipper, my mum would raise her eyebrows and say "You won't starve." This has, I believe, lent a great deal to my sense of security; my sense that I can think my way out of any corner I may find myself in. But she also often told me "I want doesn't get," which is perhaps why I've never believed in the american dream as it were - I fear she may unwittingly have helped to remove my ambition. Meanwhile my favourite bit of throwaway philosophy is the simple phrase "You never know" - often used, but seldom grasped and borne in mind.

I think it was a sad day when the insult "saaad" started up. By my reckoning it was around 1990 or so, but perhaps y'all have different ideas. I'm saaad for being a sexually obsessed has-been drummer who now markets windows, Neil's saaad for encoding series two of Sorry in his living room, Frinky's saaad for making time machines - see, we're all saaad. The over-use of this word in this context has only served to make us all feel a lot sadder, I weckon. By comparison, "gay" is quite an upturn.

I don't know if that's quite what you were after, Mr jew.



Is this you? (One for gazzyk1ns there.)


Edit: or seventeen, if you like.

[Pinball]

The worst nickname I saw someone get at school was spunkbubble. It always stuck in my mind as a particularly deprecatory nickname.

[mook]

"He'll never have to darn his socks."

It was something my grandfather said to my parents after I was sent home from school for selling cigarettes to the naughty smokey boys when I was 11. I used to sneak in and buy them from the vending machine in the village pub for I think £1.80 a packet and flog them off individually for 15p each. Nice little profit I'll think you'll agree.


Mook, sometime in the early eighties.

[no_offenc]

Isn't that that bloke off Robot Wars?  With the high voice and the boss robot?

[mook]

Tch...you young'uns, that's Pogo Patterson that is. Chubby possibly asmatic pre-pubescent ginga entrepreneur from BBC's controversial childrens television programme Grange Hill. I dunno no sense of history kids these days. ;-)

[5 Knuckle Shuffle]

Tch...you young'uns, that's Pogo Patterson that is. Chubby possibly asmatic pre-pubescent ginga entrepreneur from BBC's controversial childrens television programme Grange Hill. I dunno no sense of history kids these days. ;-)

CURRENT WHEREABOUTS: Has been spotted working as a used car salesman; as a newsagent he lost his licence for selling some items to underage customers!


Ever the schemer, eh?

[poison popcorn]

is it just me or is there something a bit 'maxine carr' about old pogo..?

[Uncle_Z]

My first boss once said "Work's shit, get a fucking hobby"

[terminallyrelaxed]

"Never do business with a religious sonofabitch, not with God telling him how to fuck you on the deal....You want  money? You can have all the money you want, but who wants to be the richest guy in some ceme-tary? Not much left to spend it on eh Gramps?" William S Burroughs, Words Of Advice For Young People - Material with William S Burroughs, Island Records

Those really do occur to me regularly, have done ever since I got the free disc off the cover of Vox all those years ago.

Make 'em laugh, son...

My Dad re: Ladies.

Actually I've got loads from my Dad, "never let the sun go down on a quarrel", "good looks alone are not enough", and I'll probably think of a few more...

[Crazy Penis]

Do you want a smack? and Use your head.

Silly mummy

[Pinball]

"Work to live, don't live to work"

[burpmitosis]

Don't eat crisps with green bits on.

Don't pick your nose your brains will fall out.

If the wind changes you'll stay like that.

Never trust a man in a beard (a little subbuteo man?)

Don't eat raw potatoes or apple pips.

Don't drink orange and milk too closely together as they will curdle in your tummy.

I might think of more yet.

[Manford Thirty-Sixborough]

Never walk around with a biro in your breast pocket, unless you want people to think you're a geography teacher.

It's important to know how to manage your manager, so that you can manipulate them* to your own needs.

* I did point out that this sholud have been "him or her"

[Pythov]

'you can't cure a fast with a feast'

This is easily one of the few phrases I remember most.  It is especially true if you feel a little dehydrated after a night out.  My instinct is to drink a couple of litres of water from the tap, but I feel better if I drink many small glasses of water over a couple of hours.

[phes]

"Work to live, don't live to work"

In a similar vein, I remember an old Sugarhil Gang mix with a sample that went -

( Phone rings )

Employee             " Sorry boss, I will not be in for work today "
Boss                           " What is wrong, are you sick? "
Employee                         " No sir, I am too well to come to work today ".

[Dusty Gozongas]

When it's obvious that a taxi driver or bellboy or somesuch should be given a tip, offer: "don't bend over near swinging doors".  That one worked for me nana and it works for me.

Mind you, back in those days they'd've elected a dog shit if it was wearing a red rosette and those tories could slither under a door with a top hat on.   Lord have mercy.

[Gamma Ray]

Res ipsa loquitor

[Dusty Gozongas]

i'm half expecting some ancient Roman pedants to say sommat.  Then again, latin-via-google led me to offer that.

[untitled_london]

gah - no ones has said:

dont eat yellow snow

dont piss into the wind

dont whistle whilst your eating custard

i got those from random adults.

other ones that stucke were:

think before you speak.

you gotta kiss arse before you can kick arse

you'll get square eyes

dont buck the system

that batch were mainly my parents gems

but the one i always remebered,

when you take a girl out - you are responsible for her, so make sure you take her all the way back to her door, incase something happens to her on the way home.

dunno why my mates mum was telling me that, but it seemed to have a certain resonance, and it stuck.

[DaFuzz]

It's quality not quantity that counts ( first heard that one whilst collecting conkers).

and another recent one which keeps popping into my mind:

Buy land cause god aint making any more of it.

[Jed Maxwell]

Reminded of one that always stays with me from when I was on holiday in Egypt a few years ago.

The locals hassle you constantly for money and after a while it really grates. Some beggars used to hang around the hotel enterance opening the door for you when you went in or out then sticking their hand out saying  'tip, tip, tip?'.
I was following a chunky bloke with a strong Bolton/Wigan accent into the hotel one day when someone held the door open for this bloke and his wife. Sure enough as they walked through the Eygiption gave it the usual 'tip? tip?' to which the bloke instantly and deadpan replied 'aye, never go swimming after a big dinner'.
Slightly cruel but I found it highly amusing.

[Gazeuse]

Listen to everything and believe half - Grandma Gaz

Never work for a boss - Dad Gaz

[gazzyk1ns]

Whilst chatting to a mate who was bogged down with revision and exams recently, he offered "It all gets done in the end..." - meaning that you should never worry when faced with a mountain to climb - because it does indeed always get done in the end. I thought for a second, slightly dubious, and to prove his point, he said "You do always get everything you're asked to do done to an acceptable standard, within an acceptable time frame, don't you? Always." He's right...

[Stripeyjoe]

My drunk friend... "no wonder I was sick, look, my stomach was full of puke"

It's nice to be nice to the nice.

Couldn't stop a pig in a ginnel (is that how you spell ginnall?)

You're a shower of cunts

ouch, ya cobbldey bastard (nauseaus friend in van going along cobbled street)

I would rather cover myself from head to foot in my own excrement than ever have to listen to/see/do......... again (nicked from Norbet Smith I do believe)

My nan had me convinced for years that if I ever cut the bit of skin between my thumb and index finger I'd get lock jaw and starve to death. Got my own back by convincing her she'd get eye cancer from watching too much daytime tv.
SJ

[gazzyk1ns]

My drunk friend... "no wonder I was sick, look, my stomach was full of puke"

Heh, brilliant.

[untitled_london]

My drunk friend... "no wonder I was sick, look, my stomach was full of puke"

Heh, brilliant.

seconded

[Big Jack McBastard]

I have the occasional habit of writing things that utterly infuriate (some) people as a result my personal favourite is:

"Never write anything down"

Obviously that only really applies when someone who knows you is reading it, then again try telling that to Salman Rushdie.

[neveragain]

As Petula Clark once sang, 'Don't piss in the subway, darling'.