What's in a saying?: Six of one, half dozen of the other

My Gramps was famous for expressions, and even made-up words for things.

If you were around him enough (as I was when I was young), then it was easy to know what he meant by “hand me the thing-um-a-jig in the whats-ummy there in the corner” (read: pass me the spatula in the drawer – so I can flip the pancakes).

He also used some words that do really exist in dictionaries, but you might not think they would… like “flibbertigibbet”. You know, as in “That Mrs. So-and-So was a real flibbertigibbet, keeping you at the fence all afternoon with her chatter if you weren’t careful”.

My dad used to shake his head at all these silly words and sayings (I don’t think he could keep up with them all). But I loved hearing words like that. I used to think that it must have been my Gramps who invented cool words. I figured he gave Mary Poppins the idea for “supercalifragilisticexpialidocious”.

I tried to look up “six of one…” to see if there was an interesting story behind it, but I couldn’t find anything except that the saying has existed since the 1800s. It, of course, means that two alternatives are equal.

“Shall we take Main Street or the back way home?” Gramps would reply,” It’s six of one, half dozen of the other”.

The most interesting twist to all this is that he also used an alternative: “One horse, one rabbit”. This phrase was used in the same way, although I am not sure how horses and rabbits could be interchangeable.

The more time I spent with my Gramps, the more easily I came to understand all his sayings and habits. It became something special between us. We were like two peas in a pod. (Sorry, I couldn’t resist.)

I have had the good fortune to develop many special relationships in my life, one of my favourites being with my chef husband. We met working in the kitchen, and we still cook together often.

Many expressions exist around cooking and eating, and since Martin is a francophone he has even more sayings that he brings from his mother tongue.

I remember once making raspberry sauce for a trifle. It had to be cooled down, so we poured it from the pot into a bowl and Martin said, “Just put its bum in the water.” There was a larger bowl half full of water sitting on the counter, so I knew just what he meant.

It made me feel special knowing that I could keep up with what he needed. It’s fun to share a special moment with someone close; it can be as delightful as tasting a dessert (the trifle was delicious).

I suppose I could get quite corny at this point, “going whole hog” on the food expressions. But that would really “take the cake”, don’t you think? (Did you know that comes from cake walk competitions in the 1800s? They were something like musical chairs, with the last person left being the one to “take the cake” as a prize.)

All kidding aside, I want to use one last idiom to represent how we feel about loved ones. When we can fondly remember silly sayings and quirky habits, well then, “The proof is in the pudding” – we really do love them dearly.

I do hope you enjoy your pudding this holiday season

This article is written by or on behalf of an outsourced columnist and does not necessarily reflect the views of Castanet.