Something Rhymes with Purple - Scotch on the Rocks

Episode Date: June 20, 2023

We love hearing from you, find us @SomethingRhymes on Twitter and Facebook, @SomethingRhymesWith on Instagram or you can email us on our NEW email address here: [e-mail] Want even more purple, people? Join the Purple Plus Club by clicking the banner in Apple podcasts or head to purpleplusclub.com to listen on other platforms' Don’t forget that you can join us in person at our upcoming tour, tap the link to find tickets: www.somethingrhymeswithpurple.com  Enjoy Susie’s Trio for the week:  1. Malifuff: Feckless and entirely incapable of doing anything capable. 2. Nasalating: Difficulty breathing through the nose. 3. Scrittle-scrattle - Difficulty in making ends meet. Gyles' poem this week is Poor Little Rich Girl by Noel Coward Poor little rich girl, you're a bewitched girl Better take care Laughing at danger, virtue a stranger Better beware The life you lead sets all your nerves a-jangle You love affairs are in a hopeless tangle Though you're a child, dear Your life's a wild typhoon In lives of leisure, the craze for pleasure Steadily grows Cocktails and laughter, but what comes after? Nobody knows You're weaving love into a mad jazz pattern Ruled by pantaloon Poor little rich girl Don't drop a stitch too soon You're only a baby You're lonely, and maybe Someday soon you'll know The tears you are tasting Are years you are wasting Life's a bitter foe With fate it's no use competing Youth is so terribly fleeting By dancing much faster You're chancing disaster Time alone will show In lives of leisure, the craze for pleasure Steadily grows Cocktails and laughter, but what comes after? Nobody knows A Sony Music Entertainment production.   Find more great podcasts from Sony Music Entertainment at sonymusic.com/podcasts     To bring your brand to life in this podcast, email [e-mail]  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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amex.ca slash yamex. Benefits vary by card, other conditions apply. Annex. Benefits vary by car and other conditions apply. Hello, and welcome to another episode of Something Rhymes with Purple. If you're new to our podcast, it's all about words and language. And it's hosted by me, Charles Brandreth, and my good friend, Susie Dent. Susie is a leading lexicographer. She's an author. She's a television personality, and she's just a brilliant human being. How are you today, Susie? Thank you. Yes, I'm very well, thank you. The sun is positively shining and I have been apricating outside during my lunch break. You've been what,

outside? Apricating. Oh, this is enjoying apricity. Well, apricity is more specifically winter. To apricate is simply to bask in the rays of the sun. Now, spell that word for us. A-P-R-I-C-A-T-E, and not, at least not in its more recent incarnations, linked to apricot, although it's tempting to think of it in the same way. Apricot is from a word meaning. So, what is the origin of this word apricating? Just a Latin word, very rare, I think. Latin word apricare, to bask in the sun. That actually is what the word means. The Latin word means to bask in the sun, apricare. Well, if you've just joined our podcast,

you'll discover already what it's about. It's where Susie Dent introduces us to new words. Sometimes they're very old words like that one. Other times they really are brand new words. That features in every episode. We have three interesting words like that one. Other times they really are brand new words. That features in every episode. We have three interesting words from Susie. We also usually have a poem from me. And often I choose the poem based on whatever the conversation is that Susie and I have had before, you know, while we're actually doing the podcast.

I think, oh, that would be appropriate. but I've recently been dipping into again the works of one of my favorite authors who was a novelist a poet but is best known as a playwright and that is Noel Coward who was born in 1899 so we're coming up to the 125th anniversary of his birth and I've recently been to see a revival of one of his earliest and most successful plays, The Vortex. And I was reading, and I'm going to read at the end of this episode, one of his song lyrics, which I think works as a poem. And it's a famous song called Poor Little Rich Girl. And do you know this song at all? It's been revived over the years.

But it contains a phrase in it, which is relevant to what we're going to talk about. And the phrase is, cocktails and laughter, but what comes after, nobody knows. The rest of the poem, you'll have to wait till the end of the podcast for. But cocktails and laughter, I hope, are what this episode is going to be all about. Do you enjoy a cocktail? I love a cocktail. I am the only drinker between us, aren't I? Because I know you no longer drink cocktails.

I am a notorious lightweight. So one cocktail is enough for me and enough for everyone else when they're with me because I literally go quite faint and then have to eat a lot of food and then go to sleep. So, but I love cocktails. But there are non-alcoholic cocktails, aren't there?

So I could be drinking cocktails. But can you begin-alcoholic cocktails, aren't there? So I could be drinking cocktails. But can you begin by telling us the origin of the word cocktail? I wish I could because it is, the origins are so elusive. Do you remember a word programme called Balderdash and Piffle, which British listeners to Something Wise with Purple may remember? Do you remember this? No. I was very sad not to be part of it.

I wasn't asked. And it was quite a few years ago now and it was essentially part of a big national effort by the Oxford English Dictionary to find printed records of words dating earlier from the ones that they'd found because they were convinced that certain words and expressions must have been around for longer than the first records they had and one of those words was

cocktail and they had lots of celebrities on there trying to hunt things down and you know just basically leading the word hunt themselves for that little section and jerry hall actually talked about the word cocktail and it's first mentioned in 1803 in a new hampshire newspaper called the farmer's cabinet and it's in a diary of a lounger and it goes drank a glass of cocktail excellent for the head called at the doctors drank another glass of cocktail so we don't know what drink it was but clearly it had quite a therapeutic effect and then within about three years later it was becoming a little bit more you know familiar now lots and lots of different theories to this one is that there was simply the feather from a cockerel that was actually put in the drink much as we might get a little paper

umbrella in there now that it was actually used to decorate the cocktail once it was served there's another theory that actually the cocktail's feather was used to stir the different spirits that were put on so that you know the physical act of mixing ingredients together there's another origin that leads us back to a french term cocktail which is a type of little tiny container in which beverages were once served so imagine you're taking a tequila shot or you were at one point, Giles, and it was kind of similar size and that that evolved into cocktail.

There's another, less common, but still, that it comes from Mexican Spanish term, cola de galo, meaning a rooster's tail. And that, again, takes us back to the garnish. So honestly, it's such a subject of debate. I think I just simply like the rooster's feather idea, but we still don't know. Well, we'll go with the rooster's feather. In my drinking days, I liked wine.

I liked sparkling wine as well. And I occasionally would have vodka and orange juice, which I think is called, is that called a mimosa correctly? I think that's what it could be called. And I liked also Bloody Mary, which is vodka and tomato juice, isn't it? It is. I don't recall really having any gin-based cocktails, though I did for a while go a phase of really loving a gin and tonic. I've only ever had two whiskies in my life.

One was when I was in northern France and went to a bar where I had heard that Jean-Paul Sartre was hanging out. And the idea of being in the same room with Jean-Paul Sartre was irresistible. I went there, I had to order a drink, I didn't know what to order, so I somehow ordered a whisky. The whisky was disappointing, and worse, and in fact, I ended up pouring it away. And even more disappointing was that Jean-Paul Sartre didn't turn up. Oh, I so would love to be able to drink whiskey. I'd love to say also, can I have a scotch on the rocks?

Because it just sounds really good. It gives you that gravelly voice and it gives you gravitas. I just hate it. It's very sad. I did once have a scotch on the rocks offered to me in a house in Regents Park. I was about 19 or 20 at the time. I accepted it. And then I took a sip and I clearly couldn't drink it. So what I did was I was sitting on a low chair, an armchair in a large drawing room. And the master of the house, who was the father, the distinguished father of the girl, who was my friend who had invited me to meet her parents.

And I poured the whiskey from the glass into my shoes to get rid of it, hoping that the moisture would be absorbed by my socks. And I poured it first, half of it into one shoe and then half into the other shoe. And it seemed to settle there. And all was well until the time came for me to leave when I got up and squelched, squelched across the carpet, leaving these terrible shoe marks in the shape. Oh, can you imagine?

That's not good. Oh God. I mean, you know, here I am all these years later, remembering it. Yes. Well, mortifying, but we all have our... Yes. But but i'm just going to say i do like a hot toddy so that i will i will take a whiskey and a hot toddy i think that's good hot water sugar spices that that is really nice but i i can't do it neat i'm afraid which but what you've chosen for us today is a selection of

amusing famous cocktails and the interesting names they have so never mind my mimosa what was that peach juice no how many a mimosa is champagne oh i'm gonna look this up for you please would you look up a mimosa for me and find out what it is because it is champagne and orange juice champagne and orange juice yes very good so what is vodka and orange juice oh do you know what i think we need our producer naya to come in here because i don't you just call it is vodka and orange juice? Oh, do you know what? I think we need our producer Naya to come in here. Because don't you just call it a vodka and orange, I think, can't you? Really? Don't you? I think so.

I mean, we ought to know more about this. Vodka, there's, oh, a Cape Cod is a vodka and cranberry. I'm looking that up now. Oh, that sounds nice. Vodka and orange. This is fun. Vodka and orange juice. Let's see what it's called. Vodka and orange juice. It's a screwdriver. That's the word I was looking for.

A screwdriver. For goodness sake. I'm sorry. I'm so not an expert. I wonder why it's called a screwdriver. Maybe we shouldn't go there because some of them are incredibly... Cheeky and rude. Closer than I thought they were.

Actually, maybe you're right. It drives you to screwing because you've had too many screwdrivers. And what do you end up doing? I don't know. You haven't asked me for my favorite cocktail of the moment i mean well tell me i you can lead from now on in first of all suzy dent what is your favorite cocktail at the moment well one of my local cafes does this amazing gin fizz so this is gin prosecco and elderflower cordial. Oh. It is superb.

It's a little bit lethal as well, though, so one is all I can take, but absolutely lovely. Can I say, I go to a cafe for a cup of tea and a scone. Well, this is evening. I wouldn't have this in the morning or the afternoon. Ah, in the evening. And you go there and you have, what's it called again, this thing? It's just called a gin fizz, I think.

A gin fizz. I don't know. Yeah, I'm sure it's got a more elegant name. Do you go in on your own and say, I have a gin fizz? No, I don't go on my own. I don't really drink on my own, do you? No, you don't drink at all? No, I don't drink at all. Why did you stop drinking, incidentally? I stopped, well, I was in the 1990s, I was a Member of Parliament, and by the time I lost my seat, my wife said to me, you were put on two stone. I wonder, politics must drive you to drinking, drinking. Well, it was because in my day, there were lots of late nights. And indeed, there were even all night sittings. And I was a

government whip, which meant I was there. Literally, when Parliament was sitting, I was there from about seven, the latest eight, usually seven in the morning, until we shut up shop, which was 11 o'clock at night, or sometimes later, sometimes right through the night. And therefore, I would literally eat and sleep there. And in the evenings, you'd go to the members bar and you'd have a few drinks there and then you'd go and have dinner and you have a few drinks there. And then you find where you've got another hour to wait for the next vote. You'd have another drink. And so... Did you not just fall asleep all the time? Yes. And there was a lovely... The library has has in it particularly in the third room which is my favorite room known as the quiet room it had leather armchairs that had extensions on that were like a bed oh yeah so you could go in there and you could sleep it off

and and you did so i basically i put on weight through eating and drinking too much so i thought to lose weight i will give up drink. And I gave up drink completely overnight and did indeed lose the weight. And after about six months, I thought, oh, I have a glass of wine. And it gave me a headache, almost a migraine. I thought, oh, I'll steer clear. And then a week later, I'll have another glass of wine. Just need to get back into it. And I began seeing stars, literally, you know, bright lights in my eyes. I had to lie down. I thought, this is bad. I went to see the doctor and he said, oh no, it's probably your age. You know, just, I mean, it doesn't suit you anymore. You could try having organic wine.

And I thought, oh, I don't want to bother this. He said, you can try spirits. I thought, ah, forget it. So I thought, I will give up alcohol completely. And i truly have hardly missed it at all i for a i still would like the ritual at six o'clock to mark the end of the day yeah uh and i do have as you know my fortnum and mason sparkling tea and you're still hoping for a fortnum and mason's lorry to turn up one day i am but as you know they did send me one bottle. They gave you one bottle. One bottle. So I want... But at your Gin Fizz Palace that you go to, do they do non-alcoholic cocktails? Would you take me there one day?

Lots of them. So mocktail actually dates back to the 1930s. So clearly we've been having this for a little while. But first of all, I'm going to start with the alcoholic ones. Please. Because they are the ones that are most well-established when it comes to their nomenclature. So mojito so i will start with the mojito do you know what a mojito is i've heard of a mojito i've no idea what a mojito is okay so this is white rum lime or lemon juice sugar mint

ice and fizzy water uh and it is very nice and we think this comes from uh simply something that gives you mojo so cuban spanish mojo is not not the mojo that actually is the magic charm or talisman or spell that actually goes back to an african word witchcraft meaning witchcraft mocha but actually this is a cuban sauce or marinade it's something sort of quite spicy i think it's got garlic and sour oranges in it and things anyway the origin of that is a spanish word meaning to make wet and obviously you wet your whistle when you have your mojito very nice so that's that one i like a mojito and as you name each of these tell me if you've actually had one you've obviously had a mojito because you say you like it. Yes, I have had a mojito.

And, you know, they are very nice. I'm not amazing on spirits, but I don't have them very often. But anyway, that is very nice. Then there's the margarita. I think I have heard of this one. But what does it contain? I don't know. Is this got tequila in it?

Yes. And tequila is a kind of rum. Is that right? Tequila? That's a very good question, actually. Tequila, we have tequila shots famously. I think it's made from an agave plant. So I don't think it is rum.

It's named after the town of Tequila in Mexico. And it's, you know, agave, we have agave nectar now, which is the sort of sweetener that a lot of people use. They're made from the sap of the agave tree or plant. So I think that's what it's based on. So anyway, back to margarita that is simply from the spanish meaning margaret and you might possibly have a margarita with your margarita pizza which is spelled differently that's m-a-g-h-e-r-i-t-a that's pizza top with well that's your basic one, isn't it? It's cheese, tomato,

basil also traditionally. And that was named after Margherita of Savoy, who was Queen Concert of Italy in the 19th century. And the toppings of a margarita, that cheese, tomato and basil represent the three colours of the Italian flag. That's clever. And so the margarita drink is tequila and lime juice, isn't it? Tequila and yes, some kind of citrus juice. Very good. We should issue a health warning here to say to people, you don't have to drink these things to enjoy the language and don't drink too much. I was reading, I don't know if you've read or listened to Prince Harry's book Spare. Well, he describes in it having magic mushrooms, not that many years ago at a party in Hollywood. I think it was in Hollywood. And as a result of these magic mushrooms,

he then, to take away the sort of strange feeling, he had a series of tequila shots, which resulted in him hallucinating and sort of, he found himself in the loo talking to the toilet. Oh, I remember that episode. I talking to the toilet oh wait i remember that episode i listened to the audible version where it was him reading it he was actually a very very good narrator isn't he yeah yeah i enjoyed i found it completely fascinating but it is a warning please yeah go carefully when it comes to alcohol okay give us another one doing responsibly mai tai now i've definitely never had a Mai Tai. It sounds very exotic and it probably tastes very exotic because it's got rum. Now, how do you pronounce this? Is it curacao?

Oh, curacao. Yes, I think I just heard it. Yes, curacao. So that is a liqueur, isn't it? And it tastes like bitter oranges. I think it's actually made from the peel of bitter oranges. Anyway, back to the Mai Tai, it's curacao, light rum and various other fruit juices. So it sounds very nice. It's actually Polynesian and commonly believed to mean good or excellent in Tahitian, actually. And it's very much associated with Polynesian culture and its wonderful tropical settings. People who make these things, I've seen the sign up saying the mixologist is now on duty. They're called mixologists, aren't they?

The people who... Yes. The cocktail creators. That's interesting. I'm going to see, because everyone thinks probably of the film cocktail and Tom Cruise. Have you ever seen that? Not that I remember. Absolute classic.

Okay. Well, mixologist. If I were to ask you, Giles, how old do you think that word is? What would you say? I would say, now it's going to be as early as the 1940s. Actually, can you believe this? It's a century earlier, 1856. No.

Yes. Oh, I'm amazed. I know. And there's a quote in the OED from 1870 where it says, the most delicate fancy drinks are compounded by skillful mixologists in a style that captivates the public. Isn't that incredible? That is amazing.

That's much, much more modern. So that's that one. And actually, mixology is, yeah, similar, 1870s. So that's been around for a very long time. Pina Colada. Now, that was the kind of height of exoticism when I was growing up. You must have had one of those. I don't think, do you know, I think I'm so, no.

I'm so po-faced, or was so po-faced, which I now know, thanks to you, could well be from the chamber pot that the phrase po-faced comes, that I think I was rather, I mean. Oh, I don't think I told you that. Oh, didn't you? Things like pina colada, I wouldn't have had them. I mean, I'd have had maybe a gin and tonic, possibly, vodka and something. But I wouldn't have had these cocktails. I don't think I would. Okay. Or a glass of wine.

Well, pina colada is one of the most famous. And it reminds me of the sort of 1970s dinner parties where pina colada, as I say, was the height of fancy. So it's... It's got coconut in it, doesn't it? Yeah, coconut, pineapple juice. What else do you put in a pina colada? Rum? It's rum.

It's essentially strained pineapple is what that in a pina colada so it's it's rum it's it's essentially strained pineapple is what that means pina colada so yeah rum pineapple juice and coconut but um yes much nicer in spanish than it is in you can call a cocktail strained pineapple but that's what it means and that's what it means pina colada means as in a calendar is that the word colada yes exactly right strained and pina as in pineapple? Yes. Oh, well, if you stop to think about it, it's very, very straightforward, isn't it? It is.

It is. So there's that one. There's a de Curie, which is also the name of the beach near Santiago de Cuba. And the drink was supposedly invented by a mining engineer, because there's an iron mine there as well, who was in Cuba at the time of the Spanish-American War. So that is the idea. How do you pronounce this?

Dakiri. So D-A-I. Oh, you mean as in daiquiri? Sorry, I've never had one. So daiquiri. All the purple people will be laughing in unison at my pronunciation of that. Daiquiri. No, I'm only saying daiquiri because I think I've heard it said in movies.

I'll have a Daiquiri. Okay. But I thought Daiquiri was a make of. No, well, it's an epitoponym. So it's a rum producing district in Cuba, but it's rum and lime is a Daiquiri. And actually, I'm pleased to say I've just looked up the pronunciation in Oxford Dictionaries online. It gives us both.

That's good. Well done. Yes. And I'll give you one more. Martini. Everyone, I mean, martini, shaken, not stirred, all of that. Different theories for this one as well. Obviously, you've got the martini brand of vermouth.

There was also a cocktail called the Martinez that was served in the 1860s in a hotel in San Francisco and people would regularly go there before taking an evening ferry so one of the things that you do know and we can talk about Bellinis and things as well is um they're often named after people bartenders who created things and it's the same with food actually Nacho is another example um or the places where they were first made. So, yeah, those seem to be the two driving forces, really, behind cocktail names. Well, will you give us a couple more when we come back? We've got time for those.

Yeah. Because I want to know more about the Negroni. And also, I think there's a cocktail called Gunfire. Hi, I'm Jesse Tyler Ferguson, host of the podcast Dinners on Me. I take some of my favorite people out to dinner, including, yes, my Modern Family co-stars, like Ed O'Neill, who had limited prospects outside of acting. The only thing that I had that I could have done was organize crime. And Sofia Vergara, my very glamorous stepmom.

Well, why do you want to be comfortable? Or Julie Bowen, who had very special talents. I used to be the crier. Or my TV daughter, Aubrey Anderson-Emmons, who did her fair share of child stunts. They made me do it over and

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Download Bumble and try it for yourself. Welcome back to the pub crawl around the language of cocktails. And as the purple people listening to this will have gathered, neither Giles nor I are particularly experienced at drinking lots of cocktails. So this is as much a voyage of discovery as we hope it is for you. Now, you asked me about the Negroni, didn't you? So you know what Negroni is?

No. Gin, vermouth and Campari. Do you remember those Campari ads? I do. Oh, were those the wonderful advertisements with Leonard Rossiter and Joan Collins? Wasn't it Lorraine Chase as well? Was that something else?

Oh, maybe. Hang on, I'm going to look it up now. We're totally useless here. No, there was, there absolutely was Joan Collins. And can I say, the contents of these drinks are not making me feel nostalgic for alcohol at all. No. Vermouth, I mean, this doesn't tempt me.

Okay, Campari Alpha, it was Lorraine Chase and she would say, Luke Nairport, when she was advertising something very, very exotic. And it was very funny. And Joan Collins and Leonard Rossiter. It wasn't that martini. That was Cinzano. Cinzano, of course.

Yes, Cinzano. Yeah, that was excellent. You know, I think it was Noel Coward's recipe for a martini was to take a large glass, fill it with gin and then wave it vaguely in the direction of Italy. Well, just before we get to the Negroni, I mentioned just before the break that actually many are really plainly associated with their birthplaces. Many are really plainly associated with their birthplaces. You've got the Manhattan. You've got the Singapore Sling.

You've got the Bucks Fizz, which was apparently first made at London's Bucks Club. And as I said, Martini may have been from Martinez, the city in Western California. But some are to do with names and not always actually the name of the mixologist that created them. So the Bellini is a lovely exception so the bellini which i have had a bellini and i'm now reminding myself tap tap tap i certainly have had many a bellini that i did love have you you can tell me what's in there i think it's peach juice and prosecco because i feel that i first had it many years ago about 40 years ago in venice years ago, in Venice. Lovely.

Does that sound right? Well. The kind of thing that you get if you went into Harry's bar. Absolutely. And it was said to have been invented in Venice. But do you know what it has to do? Well, do you know who Bellini was, for a start? Well, there were an artist called Bellini, a great artist.

Absolutely. Giovanni Bellini was a very famous Venetian artist, as you say, and there was a major exhibition of his work in 1948. And it is said that the cocktail was created by Giuseppe Cipriani because he wanted to reproduce the sumptuous tones that you would find in Bellini's art. Isn't that lovely? Lovely. And actually, Cipriani also, the creator of the Bellini, also said to be behind carpaccio, the dish of raw meat that you will have. And again, neither of us will know that because we're veggie. But that was named along the same lines after the scarlet-robed figures that feature in another artist

called Vittore Carpaccio. Oh, I didn't know that about Carpaccio. But Cipriani, I do know. And I've actually stayed at the Cipriani Hotel owned by the Cipriani family. Yes. Oh, wow. Which is marvelous. And I've also been to their wonderful restaurant that they have on the island of Torcello,

which is an island off. Yeah. That sounds so romantic, Torcello. Oh, can I tell you, it is romantic. So that's at the northern end of the Venetian Lagoon, isn't it, Torcello? It is. It's absolutely marvellous. Beautiful. I just absolutely love the name of it. Right. I think it is time to get off the booze and to move towards our lovely purple people themselves and get some correspondence in.

Yes. Let us sober up. And who has been in touch with us recently? Well, the first question comes from, and apologies for the mispronunciation, it is inevitable when I pronounce this, Kai Hung. I hope that's right, Kai.

So it's K-H-A-I and then H-O-O-N-G. Dear Susie and Giles, I would like to inquire about the origin of the following words, study, sturdy, and steady. And Kai says that they want to know if these words are connected in any way. How interesting. It is interesting. And I am probably going to disappoint you completely, Kai, because the answer is no.

But they do have quite interesting stories behind them. Well, some of them do. So I'll start with study. That's possibly the least interesting. Came into English from the French étudier, to study. But both of those words are based on the Latin studium, which actually meant taking real care. So painstaking application to a task in hand. Then you have steady, and steady is from the Old English sted, which meant a place, and you'll find relatives in lots of different

languages. There's stadt in German, and it also gave us stand, if you take it back far enough. if you take it back far enough. Instead is in place of, we have steadfast, which is standing firm or fast, homestead, etc. So, if you are steady, you are not easily moved from your place. So, place is the important word there. And finally, sturdy, this is my favourite one. So, this takes us all the way back to the Latin word for for a thrush so if you at the bird if you look at the scientific name for a thrush it's turdus t-u-r-d-u-s turdus or turdus and it's a little bit of a strange story but we think that what happened was that thrushes in Roman vineyards would often feed on grapes that had fermented on the vine and then fall into the ground. And thrushes would eat these and get slightly tipsy. And still in French, if you were sous le commun grieve, you were drunk as a thrush. So nowadays we might say

pissed as a newt. In those days, you would say drunk as a thrush and the very first meaning of sturdy really was stunned or dazed just so you had drunk a little bit too much and if you were stunned or dazed you could become a little bit reckless you could also become a little bit intractable and a bit obstinate and so sturdy came to mean someone who would not move and who was a little bit intransigent. And then, I mean, what a journey this word has had. It came on to mean someone who was sort of solid, if you like, in every different way. So a cupboard may be sturdy, a person may be sturdy if they're solidly built. A bike might be sturdy enough to withstand, you know, big bumps in the road, that kind of thing. But yeah, what a journey from being drunk as a thrush to being strongly built.

Well, thank you for that, Susie. Journeys are made by people who listen to our podcast, because we get communications from all over the world, sent to us at our current address, which is purplepeopleatsomethingrhymes.com. And this message comes from Elza Kindy, who writes to us most charmingly. Hello, Susie and Giles. I'm an avid word nerd with an interest in etymology. While I love finding obscure, obsolete, and unusual words, I'm fond of taking a closer look at the ones we use every day. My question relates to one such word.

I was recently pondering the word yet. It's a bit of a throwaway word in modern use, but it has a poignant punch in literary places. I was hoping you might be able to shed some light on where this word originated and how it came to be used. Much lexical love from the United States, Elza Kindy. Okay, that was a charming voice note, wasn't it? Do you know, I absolutely loved this question because it's quite a profound question, really. And just the straightforward dictionary answer

doesn't do it justice, which is that it simply was used in Old English and it has lots of what we call cognates or relatives in different languages, including the German jetzt, meaning now. But yet, as Elsa says, is a bit of a throwaway word. We use it in so many different ways. I'll just have a look at how versatile this word is. So it can mean at the present time or now, as in, are they here yet? It can mean thus far, as in, he's not come

yet. It can mean in the time still remaining, there is yet time. It can mean in addition or again, as in, oh, we've had yet another email. Or it can mean though or nevertheless, as in, it's okay, yet I feel like it could be better so all of those different uses and also there's not a lot I can say to you except that this just shows how elastic our vocabulary is that we can take a three-letter word and use it in so many different ways and I would direct you to it's not it's not really a straight answer to your question but there's a lovely YouTube video which is called the power of yet and it was done essentially by Dr Carol Dweck who is quite well known in business circles because she talks a lot about growth mindsets which I know is a term that gets quite a lot of them flack these days but she tells

the story of how when, I don't think it's when she went, it might have been when she went to school or whether it was someone she met went to school. And if they had failed their paper, the teacher wouldn't say fail or not good enough or whatever. They would just write the two words, not yet. Which is just lovely.

And she said it means the world because it basically says you can do this you're just not there yet which i just think is lovely and it's a very nice video which which takes you much beyond that single word yet and what it means but it's just a really lovely thing to to look at so i can't really tell you why english speakers decided to take it in so many different directions but i just think it's joyful that they did. And thank you for your question because I loved it. The potentially mythical beast, the Yeti, which could also be the abominable snowman, that has no connection with the word yet. Still to be discovered, I thought maybe Yeti, I don't know. Oh, I like that. Yeah, no, absolutely nothing. So that is from a native language. And I think

it means bear of the mountain or something, I think is what it means. So I think it's, I know, here it is. It's from Tibetan and Sherpa, local language. And it might mean an animal of a rocky place, but a little man-like animal is the idea there. So absolutely nothing to do with yet yet. Well, wherever you are in the world, if you've got a query about words and language or indeed anything you want to share with us, do please get in touch. You simply have to send us an email. It's purplepeople, all one word, at somethingrhymes, all one word, dot com. Now, Susie, we always have a trio, three interesting words from you. What have you conjured up for us this week? I have starting with a lovely word from the Scots dictionaries. And you know that I do

love looking at the Scottish dictionaries online, which have lots and lots of historical dictionaries of Scots in them. Malifaf, a Malifaf. If you are Malifaf, it's from the 19th century, it means you are feckless and you are entirely incapable of doing anything energetic or positive or meaningful. Malifaf. Oh, I'm feeling very Malifaf today. And as ever, the M-A-L is bad. Bad.

That's simple. When it is malevolent or malicious or anything that's got mal at the beginning suggests something that's untoward. Exactly. And the faf bit is just a bit like sort of faff, fuffle, fluffy. It's just sort of, it's never a particularly good thing, is it? Well, the fluffy can be a good thing, to be fair.

The next one is, oh, this is just a personal one that I threw in because I was listening to someone on the news the other day who clearly had a very, very bad cold and sounded like he had very bad sinuses. And he was nasolating. He was speaking through his nose. And that's from 1863, the first record, just in case you need to know what it's called, nasolating. And finally, something that I think will maybe have resonance for lots of us right now. It's quite hard to make ends meet in lots of different ways, isn't it? We are scrittle-scrattling around. Scrittle-scrattle. Difficulty in making

ends meet, perhaps from late 19th century dialect. It's interesting. It's an old word to describe a contemporary sensation. Scrittle-scrattling. Yeah. Absolutely. Interesting. Tell me your poem today. What have you chosen? Well, I'm going to give you the poem I promised, which is a lyric by Noel Coward. But first, I see if I can remember one of my favourite short poems, because we've been talking about cocktails. And this is by Dorothy Parker, the great Dorothy Parker, American humorist, writer, and a lady who had her own drink problems that were serious for her. She made fun of them in some of her poems and certainly in this very short poem.

I like to have a martini, two at the very most. After three, I'm under the table. After four, I'm under the host. A naughty poem, but great fun from the great Dorothy Barker. Yeah, I think I've heard that one before. Now, here are the lyrics of a song by Noel Coward called Poor Little Rich Girl. And I've chosen it simply because it contains that phrase that I find so evocative, cocktails and laughter, but what comes after?

Poor little rich girl, you're a bewitched girl, better take care. Laughing at danger, virtuous stranger, better beware. The life you lead sets all your nerves a-jangle, your love affairs are in a hopeless tangle. Though you're a child, dear, your life's a wild typhoon. In lives of leisure, the craze for pleasure steadily grows. Cocktails and laughter, but what comes after, nobody knows. You're weaving love into a mad jazz pattern ruled by pantaloon. Poor little rich girl, don't drop a stitch too soon. You're only a baby, you're're lonely and maybe someday soon you'll know

the tears you are tasting are years you are wasting. Life's a bitter foe. With fate, it's no use competing. Youth is so terribly fleeting. By dancing much faster, your chancing disaster time alone will show. In lives of leisure, the craze for pleasure steadily grows. Cocktails and laughter, but what comes after, nobody knows. Oh, nobody knows indeed.

So let's focus on the cocktails and the laughter and on more purple with you by our side. Thank you so much for listening to us today. Thank you so much for continuing to be loyal and for members of the purple plus club thank you to you as well and just a reminder to anyone who is interested you can get ad free listening there and bonus episodes on words and language that was it for today something rhymes with purple is a sony music entertainment production produced by naya dioio with additional production from Hannah Newton, Chris Skinner, Jen Mystery, Gully and our wonderful engineer Richie. Do you know Gully is a very good name for a cocktail? I wonder what it contains?