With the 4th of July holiday on Sunday and a "day off" from the virtual cubicle farm on Monday, I am caught flat-footed with the sudden appearance of Wednesday and (yikes!) the need to drum up something for Slang-o-rama!
So first, caught flat-footed, and then, a bookish news flash!
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Even my little visual "pause" of right-facing angle brackets are a little unprepared, which is very appropriate, for caught flat-footed means caught unprepared or taken by surprise, according to Dictionary.com. The entry goes on to say:
This usage comes from one or another sport in which a player should be on his or her toes, ready to act. [c. 1900]
The same explanation appears in The American Heritage Dictionary of Idioms by Christine Ammer. The site Idiom Origins adds that the expression is originally American, adding, "All the evidence points to its origin from being caught flat-footed or unprepared in baseball." A Wikipedia entry "List of police-related slang" has an intriguing entry on flatfoot, which expands on this possible origin:
FLATFOOT: A term with uncertain origins. Possibly related to the large amount of walking that a police officer would do; at a time when the condition flat feet became common knowledge, it was assumed that excessive walking was a major cause. Another possible origin is the army's rejection of men with flat feet, who would often take jobs in law enforcement as a backup, particularly during war when established police officers would often join up (or be forced). What is known is that by 1912, flat-footed was an insult among U.S. baseball players, used against players not "on their toes." This may have been applied to police officers sometime later, for similar reasons.
---------------------------------NEWS FLASH NEWS FLASH NEWS FLASH--------------------
On July 4th I was thrilled and honored to learn that MORTAL MUSIC is a finalist for the Will Rogers Medallion Award (WRMA) in the Maverick category.!Those of you who sport the spirit of the West, please join me as I hoot and holler and throw my hat in the air! You can see the complete list of finalists for all the categories here. Winners will be announced on October 23 at the WRMA ceremony and banquet in Ft. Worth, Texas. Congratulations to all the other finalists, and many thanks to the judges for all their hard work—they were apparently inundated with entries this year, which no doubt added to the complexity and time involved in reading and evaluating all the submittals.
Now, I'm off to scour the freezer for ice cream and to do a little celebrating...
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