A Cliche' By Any Other Name, May Be One I Just Don't Understand

So here it is, 11:51 at night, on a Friday and I'm lying in bed with my trusty computer and my faithful dog, or is it my faithful computer and my trusty dog?  No matter, really, because we are all three here.  My husband has abandonded us for the solitude of the living room and ESPN (as he prepares for the Super Bowl in two days).  "No time like the present" I suppose.  As I lie here, typing my first ever blog and pondering the point of it all, I'm wrapped up in listening to the peaceful sounds of my canine companion snoring softly, stretched out across my feet.  As he snores away, my mind begins to wander a bit and images of my husband pop into my head; images of him lying next to me snoring, only his aren't quite so soft and peaceful.  I describe his snoring, much like my mother described my fathers.  When he gets started his snoring "could wake the dead".

It's funny how the mind works sometimes.  No sooner did I hear my mother's words echo in my head, I then heard my Grandmother, "Grandpa snores to beat the band", she would always say.  I'm not sure what that meant, but it always sounded funny and we'd all get a good laugh out of it.

Growing up, our family was never at a loss to describe certain things and events in our lives.  Thinking back on those phrases now, we certainly were a colorful lot.  I think there aren't many people out there who haven't heard the old "What were you, born in a barn?" which of course means nothing more than "Shut the front door", but how about "I am not air conditioning the entire State of Texas", which also means "Shut the front door".   How about these standards: "Jiminy Christmas" or "For Pete's Sake".  In today's lingo those both would mean "Are you kidding me?"  Admittedly, I'm still trying to figure out who Pete is, or why anyone would reference the cricket from Pinocchio, but "to each his own".

As I got older I always wanted to stay out "Til the cows came home", but when you don't have cows then how the heck are you supposed to know when you are supposed to go home?  Alas, no cows meant parental curfew.  If I broke parental curfew then I was in trouble "until Hell wouldn't have it" and the only way I could be obvsolved of my punishment was if "Hell froze over".  You will never know how happy I was the day I found out that Hell was in Michigan and the first time I heard they had snow, I was right there to tell my parents I was no longer in trouble because Hell had actually frozen over.  That's about the time I learned the phrase "Over my dead body".

So "God willing, and the creek don't rise", I just about made it through my first blogging experience.  I have been writing for a little more than an hour, so now it is Saturday morning, and, based on my Grandfather's wise words of wisdom, it will remain "Saturday, all day, unless it rains".  Although my precious pup is still sound asleep at my feet, I am calling it a night, because I am "feeling like I've been ridden hard and put away wet".  So "Here's looking at you kid" and "I'll catch you on the flip side".