Listening in Downeast
Geezers say the darnedest things!
I overheard the following conversation in the checkout line at the Ellsworth, Maine Home Depot this morning:
Mike: “Jesus Christ, Harold, how you been doin’?”
Harold: “Well hello there, Mike. Didn’t see you creep up on me. You know, I can’t complain. What’ve you been up to?”
Mike: “Oh not much really, just fuckin’ the dog, you know.”
Now I’m sure that the expression “fucking the dog” (meaning doing nothing for those of you who didn’t grow up in a trailer park or a women’s prison) is not new, and neither is it peculiar to Maine, but I can tell you that this is the only place on Earth I have ever heard it uttered. God only knows where it came from, and I for one would rather not dwell on the possibilities.
I have, in fact, also heard various layabout good-for-nothing dimwits referred to as “FTD specialists.” Again, only north of the New Hampshire border. As a rule, FTD specialists are universally acknowledged to be as dim as they are slothful. As in,
My husband’s a real FTD specialist. He don’t do a goddamned thing, and he’s number than a pounded thumb to boot. He don’t know nothin’. Shit, he don’t even suspect nothin’.
I may never go back to New York.
Posted on August 8, 2012, in Commentary, The Slattern Speaks and tagged Home Depot, Humor, Maine, trailer park. Bookmark the permalink. 23 Comments.
So glad you clarified that. Now I can call off the ASPCA.
PETA already called to offer sensitivity training, but I hear it involves shock treatments and kale smoothies, and I’ve been down that road before….
Not kale smoothies! I may be a vegan, but I tried juicing kale and it tasted like my lawn.
I nominated you for a Tell Me About Yourself award. I know it’s a lot of work, and you are on vacation, but . . . http://peachyteachy.wordpress.com/2012/08/22/a-labor-intensive-award/
Many thanks for the award. I am thrilled to be in such exalted and sane company. I will endeavor to pass it forward as soon as (and if ever) I emerge from this blissed-out food coma I call vacation.
You make me laugh. I am unsure where you heard or determined that I was sane. . .I’ll try that on and wear it around today.
I hadn’t heard of FTD. So, naturally—Mind. Blown. It is funny though.
Frighteningly, it’s just the tip of the linguistic iceberg up north.
Well this is a new one for me. I’ll go ahead and consider myself enlightened for the day and start the drink parade. 🙂
Many thanks my friend.
What other course is available to us after all? Takes the sting out of being horrified anyway.
It’s just the worst phrase. Just the worst.
Oh no, there are worse ones. Far, far worse. I’ve heard things — unspeakable things — that make me blush and want to immerse my soul in bleach, and that’s going some. Then there are the expressions I don’t even understand…
Missing down east this year! Packing and de-craping the house!
So sorry to hear that, but still, it’s on to bigger and better things!
Dear Kitchen Slattern,
Failure is impossible if you just lower your sights sufficiently. Well done, good woman Tom
Can’t argue with that.
One of the things I remember are the Bert and Me records. They were G rated but funny as hell. Expecially the one about an iron lung loose in town.
Old Marshall Dodge…a funny, funny man.
good stuff here!
Thank you. Right back at ya.
FOTFL. That is just inspirational.
Took me so long to respond because I had to track down my teenage offspring to find out what FOTFL meant. I am so last decade.
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