Three Things Thursday: Old Phrases

This is kind of a short, silly post for today; I started working on a different topic and then two hours later, had only written half of it! So I’m going to save that for another time when I don’t feel rushed. (Today has been crazy–I need to remember to write about my day this weekend because it was kind of a mess.) I’m going to head over to help Becky load the moving trailer soon, because she leaves tomorrow morning for Minnesota. .

I don’t know why this topic pops into my head every so often, but there are some common phrases people use that I realized most kids probably have no idea why we say them. And it’s kind of fun to think about more that we may use and have lost their original meaning. Here are a few that we use on an everyday basis…

1. Hang up the phone / Dial a number

Anyone remember having a rotary dial phone that hung on the wall, with the long spiral cord that got stretched out and tangled over time, most likely a beige color? I imagine many kids today would have no idea what it is, let alone how to use one. We still say “hang up the phone” and “dial a number”, but it doesn’t really mean the same thing it used to. We would literally have to “hang up” the phone on the wall, and use the rotary dial to place a call.

I was surprised to see that I have a picture of me holding one! lol

2. Roll down the car window

My 2010 Jeep Patriot (which Eli drives now) still has the good old manual windows, where you have to rotate a lever to raise and lower each individual window. It also has manual locks! I actually chose those on purpose–I liked the idea of ​​being able to roll down the window in an emergency situation where modern technology might fail. Same with the locks.

I’m probably super old-fashioned, but I do think simple is better in a lot of circumstances. I always tell Jerry (and this sounds like something my dad would say) that the more bells and whistles something has, the more things there are that could go wrong with it. I frequently resist current technology in favor of the old-fashioned manual versions of things. Anyway, thanks to my Patriot, my kids understand the meaning of “rolling down” the window–although they totally disagree that simpler is better! Hahaha.

3. Rewind the video

Remember the “Be Kind, Please Rewind” expression that was posted at video stores like Blockbuster? I actually used to work at a video rental store, and when people would return video tapes without rewinding them, I would put them in a “rewinder” to make sure all of the film was shown in the left (or was it the right? window of the tape.

“Rewinding” was literally winding all of the filmstrip back to the beginning–a courtesy for people to be able to just insert the tape into a VCR and press play. We still say that we’re “rewinding” a video when we’re not actually winding anything. I’ll have to ask my kids if they know this one!


If you know of others, please share! I was having a hard time coming up with them, but I do notice them more frequently when going about my day. It’s kind of fun to see how the phrases change over the years–and it makes me wonder which modern phrases will be phased out 20 years from now.

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