Strokes, Envelopes & Chase Scenes
Have used the phrase "down to the short strokes" to mean "we are almost done here" or "we only have one or two things left to deal with." Heard co-workers use it earlier and just picked it up. Today someone not familiar with the lingo suggested the phrase might have a sexual allusion (if you don't get it , ask the attuned-to-filthy-meanings "If U Seek Amy" commenter). Of course I was a little horrified and said no it wasn't but now I can only think of the .. uh, indelicate meaning now and can't think of what it really refers to- Does it have something to do with swimming or crew or the Navy (which, if it were, wouldn't rule out the sexual meaning necessarily) ?
Which leads to other mindless phrases (mindless in the sense that while I know what they mean, I don't know why the particular words are used) like "pushing the envelope" - meaning trying to stretch something beyond its regular limit (usually what's permitted under the rules). I always thought this banally referred to over-stuffing an envelope to the point of bursting- but is that right? You don't really "push" anything when you fill an envelope. Wouldn't you say "stuffing the envelope." Or I am missing this and its something about sliding an envelope under a door?
Also "cut to the chase"- meaning "get to the point" and I think it refers to a "chase scene" in a movie or TV episode. But this only makes sense if the "chase scene" contains the resolution of the plot. However, often chase scenes just show more rising action- so are people really saying- "let's get to the exciting action scene preliminary to plot resolution" or "Lets argue emphatically some more" ?
posted by New England Guy @ 2:13 PM
10 Comments:
Pushing the envelope doesn't refer to mail envelopes. The phrase comes from math, where the envelope is regarding boundaries. People in aviation took the concept and came up with the phrase pushing the envelope to deal with planes that go beyond what had been done before. Tom Wolfe picked up the phrase and popularized it in The Right Stuff.
Cut to the chase is used when someone is used because someone is boring and meandering. Cut to the chase means let's have some action, and it's eventually come to mean get to the point.
How odd- using a familiar word "envelope" in an unfamiliar sense (at least to most people) to create a new phrase that nearly everyone understands. This is what makes language fun.
Anon is exactly right about pushing the envelope. Cut to the chase is covered here.
Phrase origins are fun. Bonus points for anyone who knows (without the google) how "beyond the pale" was derived from Irish history. I learned it from Frank Delaney's excellent novel "Ireland."
Interesting how the notion of cut to the action became cut to the resolution- a clear predisposition toward action solving problem.
No one has any thoughts the short strokes- hate to think I've been invoking pornographic imagery for 20 years every time we're close to the end on a deal.
I would assume short strokes refers to a golf game. the long strokes are off the tee and maybe the first fairway shot. The chip shot onto the green abd the put are both typically the shortest strokes for the hole.
But if you want the venal interpretation, the short strokes in golf come right before sinking your ball or scoring.
I've heard two versions of the origins of that one: the first having to do with being close to the hole in golf, and the other about a painting being almost completed. Either one works, and is far more accurate than crew or swimming -- you finish a race with the same length strokes if you're any good at either one -- and far more likely than an explicitly sexual allusion making it into common parlance.
Personally, whenever I'm involved in negotiations and it's getting close, I prefer to say, "C'mon, Ace, pinch it off."
I'm not sure if it's a sexual allusion.
SWMBCg, etc. Emphasis on the "might"
My favorite phrase is "money shot".
Thanks QG- I'll go with the arty explanation- it'll make me seem .....deep
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