Church Keys, Whizbangs and Silver Spoons, Part One

I confess. I have a bad habit of listening to what people say. With as much energy as I avoid all of the trendy expressions such as, "worst case scenario," "reaching out" instead of calling someone and "with that said," I do pay attention to the use of expressions and figures of speech. For the purposes of satisfying my word muse, I thought it might be useful to investigate the origins of a number of expressions, their origins and their interesting but sometimes unusual usage.

The first one that I examined was that of "born with a silver spoon in his mouth." Freedictionary.com provides some initial insight, "to have opportunities that you did not earn but that you have from the influence of your family."

Further investigation from phrases.org.uk disclosed that the expression was commonly thought to be a British phrase referring to the British aristocracy. As much as we may want to attribute excellent table manners and elegant cutlery to the British, this site states that the expression was first used in the US Congress in 1801: "It was a common proverb that few lawyers were both with silver spoons in their mouths." I find this particularly entertaining in consideration of our frequent habit of equating lawyers with wealth.

Somehow the expression "nitwit" came into my hearing and I wondered about its origin. It's surprisingly simple - per Thefreedictionary.com, it originates from the German "nit," meaning not and the English "wit." In other words, it is one without wit. The first evidence of it was in 1922 when it was used to described a scatterbrained or stupid person. More amusing than this, however, is the urbandictionary.com comment that "...because the word isn't in great usage right now, referring to a person as a 'nitwit' can be considered a more intense way of insulting them." Keep that in mind when you're motivated to insult someone.

If you're old enough to remember bottles that had caps needing a special tool to remove them, you may remember the designation, "church key." This is a beautiful double entendre. Somewhere along the way, the shape of the business end of the tool used to open bottles reminded someone of a big and old-fashioned door key for a church. A smaller key would be used for a smaller (less important and imposing doors). But the irony resides in the fact that the act of drinking beer can easily be considered an "unchurchly" thing to do.

My final journey into word/figure of speech origins concerned the word "whizbang." Although I've been using this word for many years, I'm not sure that I ever knew the dictionary definition of that word. According to Thefreedictionary.com, the noun is one who is conspicuously effective, successful or skillful; rushed. A more formal definition is available from dictionary.reference.com, as, "a small, high-speed shell whose sound as it flies through the air arrives almost at the same instant as its explosion," or a firecracker with the same effect. The informal definition is "first-rate; topnotch."

Apparently I'm not the only one who uses this word frequently or randomly. One of the facts that I uncovered in my diligence was the face that someone, a Mr. Herrick Kimball of Moravia, New York, has created a "Whizbang Chicken Plucker." This came as a thrilling revelation to me. Never having required the assistance of a chicken plucker, I can't imagine any better solution than one described as "whizbang."

More journeys into usage will follow. But for the moment, sharing your whizbang chicken plucker may be a good idea for a nitwit who is seriously devoid of a silver spoon.