What’s the Word: I’m waiting to be put out to pasture
Since tomorrow is Labor Day, it seemed fitting to do a column on idioms that relate to work or the workplace. It’s probably safe to say this will be a subject with an almost universal appeal since the great majority of us are among the working class, or have been for most of our lives.
Most of us are accustomed to pounding the alarm clock in a dazed stupor each workday morning when that annoying electronic beep kicks in, then dragging ourselves out of bed, standing under a spray of semi-scalding water that we hope will wake us up enough to avoid performing impromptu plastic surgery on that mole on our neck, or leg in the case of the ladies, as we make a bleary-eyed effort to shave.
On the other hand, some of us out there may be enjoying a well-deserved, comfortable, leisurely retirement.
Ahh, retirement. A chance to relax and indulge in ones hobbies. A chance to do something else for a change. Something totally different from ones former career. I know I really look forward to that myself. You know, doing stuff I really enjoy. For instance, I plan to use my newfound leisure time to do some writing, get in a little photography, get out and meet people and hear what they have to say about the world in general. In other words, something totally different from ?
Um, wait a minute here…
Well, never mind what I’m going to do. You know what I mean.
And speaking of retirement, that brings to mind a phrase people use to describe retirement, well, mostly forced retirement I guess, but most of us have heard it at one time or another. Someone will remark that some recently retired person has been “put out to pasture.”
Actually, that’s a pretty obvious one, probably referring to a race horse who has gotten too old to race, and is therefore “put out to pasture.”
Another work reference that has always intrigued me is when someone says, “you’ve got your work cut out for you.”
Well, this one is kind of obvious too if you think about it. It comes from tailoring, or more simply, sewing. While following the pattern and cutting out the cloth to make a jacket certainly involves some work, most would agree the hardest part is actually sewing them all together properly.
Nowadays “to have your work cut out for you” means you know ahead of time what the job entails, so it becomes even more dismaying since you already know how much you have to do to get it done.
Interestingly , that one has been around for a long time, all the way back to 1600 or so, and was actually used in Charles Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol.”
For those of us who use computers in the workplace, and these days, that’s a pretty big percentage and getting bigger all the time, here’s one that I’ve always been curious about.
Where did the phrase “boot up” come from. We all know it means the procedure and software loading a computer system goes through when it is started up. It’s also the period of time where many of us take our first sips off coffee as we do our own “boot up” process in the office every morning.
Anyway, apparently this goes back to the old phrase “to pick yourself up by your bootstraps,” which means to be self-sufficient and enterprising. Makes sense I guess.
A big thanks to the Word Detective website, one of my favorites on the net, for the information on all the phrases in today’s column, except for the “put out to pasture” one. If, like me, you love language and have a curious nature, I highly recommend it. It’s at www.word-detective.com.
(Charlie Johnson is a reporter for the Standard. He can be reached at 473-2191 or by e-mail at standard@blomand.net.)