I was in high school before I realized that the phrase "to jew someone down" is a reference to - you know - Jews. For years and years and years (not because I am stupid! but because I didn't hear it that often and so I didn't think about it that much), I totally thought it was an onomatopoeic approximation of the sound of a power tool. You know, JJJJJJJJJEWWWWWWWWWWWWW - like, whittling something down. I thought jewing someone down meant wearing them down until they could take it no longer and gave you the price you wanted, or possibly wearing down the price with a power tool type thing. When I hear that phrase, that's still what pops into my head.
But then this one time I was talking to one of my friends at lunch about this girl in my elementary school who used to bring Fudge Rounds to school, and she would never share. We used to offer her huge portions of our own lunches in exchange, but the only trade she would accept was two (two!) of those yummy cafeteria rolls. I was telling my friend, "One time I jewed her down to - I just realized what that meant."
Then I felt guilty.
I just wanted to tell y'all that. I have a picture of a power tool in my head right now. JJJJJJEEEEEWWWWWW. Do you understand the noise I'm making? The J is a soft J like in Arabic or French.
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6 comments:
I never ever heard that phrase before. And who was it who did this?
Yeah, I've never heard that phrase either. I guess everyone besides you caught on to the non-PC-ness of it and stopped saying it before it could reach my ears. I like your power-tool interpretation.
Never ever heard it? Drat, now I feel even racister.
I do know about being gypped! And it was only five or six years ago that I realized (because I read someone else's account of realizing) it referred to gypsies and so was Not OK.
Well WHO WAS THE STINGY FUDGE GIRL?
This is Bonnie
Well, I don't want to name names BUT IT WAS CAROLYN. Greedy.
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