In my last post, I talked about a relatively new language development that I’ve been noticing lately—the use of hashtags as social commentary in both writing and speech. Well, with the holiday season upon us, I’ve been thinking a lot about my grandparents and other beloved older adults in my life and the artful, beautiful, and not-often-heard words and expressions they use now and/or used when I was growing up—in other words, older language. I’m talking about gems like these:

• Can’t make heads or tails of it
• The greatest thing since sliced bread (Aside: I was older than I’d care to admit when it finally dawned on me that sliced bread was once considered notable because they didn’t always sell it in the grocery store!)
• You made your bed; now lie in it
• All in a tizzy…as in, “Don’t get yourself all in a tizzy. It will all work out in the end.”
• Worsh…as in, “I need to worsh the dishes.”
• the word davenport for sofa or couch
• Uff da…as in, “Uff da! It’s a cold one out ’dere today.” (Hey, I grew up in Minnesota…and yes, people really do say this here—quite a bit, in fact.)

For more about language and expressions, check out our It’s Just an Expression series. And in the meantime if you’re so inclined, please leave me a comment and let me know: What are some of the wonderful old-fashioned expressions and/or words that you grew up hearing (or maybe still hear)?