Nick’s recently acquired phrase “cock-blocked” just reminded me of an idea i had for a thread a while ago.
On the (fateful) “AJ’s Last Ride” in October, Nick taught me a funny french phrase which was the equivalent of “Go fly a Kite”, except in french it was “go fart in the flowers” (way better than the english version. Nick, could you post what that was in french again? I forget)
so my idea is that everyone posts a funny phrase that they like and explains exactly what it means, and gives an example sentence of proper usage. This is a great way to build up our bilingualism as a team, and perhaps make it easier for us to plan race strategies during an ECCC race in french so no one can understand us!
I’ll start by explaining “cock-blocked”, since I think nick still doesn’t quite get it.
To Cock-block someone is for a guy to prevent another guy from hooking up with a girl by his mere presence, or something he says, or the way he acts. For example, lets say I’m chatting up a cute girl in a bar, and things are going real well, and I’m about to get her number, and then nick comes stumbling over drunk off his ass and interrupts our conversation, and drives the girl away by being an idiot.
Then the day after I would say, “What the hell, nick, you totally cock-blocked me last night by being a drunken idiot!”
during the ice-storm of 1998, the municipal generator had stalled because of a broken spark plug that needed to be fixed. I was working on it with an old man who tried to replace it with wet and frozen fingers (this man stank like hell and had 3 teeth remaining. You would call him “un vieux verreux” - wormy - or “un vieux dégueux”. “Dégueuler” : throw up. “Ta soupe est dégueulasse”).
Anyway, so trying to put the new spark-plug in, he said : “est stiff, est stiff, comme une p’tite viarge, hehehe”…
On a separate note, at my summer job, everytime we’d be fixing some piece of machinery, and would apply some WD-40, it was the tradition to say : “ça glisse, comme popa dans moman!”
papa et maman : parents.
popa et moman : grand-parents.
Hehe, great idea, Ben! I’ve explained a few colloquialisms to my officemates in the past two years. Some popular favorites were:
Shooting the breeze: To have a conversation, usually about something trivial like the weather. “I shot the breeze with Paul and discovered that he is buying a Volkswagon Scirocco.”
F-ing the dog: To kill or waste time instead of doing work. “When my boss caught me F-ing the dog, he yelled at me to look busy.”
Puck Bunny: Young girls who are especially attracted to hockey players. “If I could skate, I might be able to date a puck bunny.”
Crack of the sparrow’s fart: The crack of dawn, early morning. “I was up at the crack of the sparrow’s fart and it was still dark out.”
Shit the bed: To completely mess something up. “Jason forgot his girlfriend’s birthday. He really shit the bed on that one.”
Useless as tits on a bull: To be unhelpful, lazy. “I asked Bert to clean up, and he f-ed the dog all afternoon. He’s as useless as tits on a bull, that one.”
That’s all that I can remember now. If you’re wondering, I worked on road construction and lived on a military base, hence all the “working” related expressions.
Well I like “j’ai cogné des clous” (I was hitting nails?) which I learned is a pretty good expression in french that has really no english equivalent for when your head bobs up and down as you fall asleep and wake up repeatedly in a lecture or something while sitting up.
Well, the way i used “cock-blocked” is how i thought it was used following Allison’s description of the term to me : That a guy interferes or prevents something from happening, which was the initiative of a girl. Then again, i was pretty drunk when she explained it to me, thus my misuse of the term. Actually, come to think of it, i think she was referring to Ben.
Vic explained to me that it can also be used in the following sense : A girl is hitting on a guy, but he gets distracted by another hot girl : she cock-blocked the first girl.
“go fly a kite”, a nice way to say “Fuck off”, is rendered in Québécois by : “va donc pèter dans les fleurs”, pronounced “va don pèté din (as in “dain-ty” ) fleurs.” This expression mostly used by kindergardeners. In elementary, you just say “Va Chier Tabarnaque”…
Here are two expressions i heard my prof use in class today (he’s born and bred in Laval) :
“Les articles 721 et 789 sont les deux mamelles du Code de procédure civile” i.e. the most important or pivotal articles in the book (from which the rest flows…)
“Le chien lààà, ya beau courir après l’autobus, mais une fois qu’il l’a pogné, qu’est-cé qui va faire avec?” i.e. the concept, although valid, has no practical application. (i strongly suspect this expression of being a very localized Laval colloquiallism).
Finally, i don’t know if this expression is used in English : “flatter dans le sens du poil” : manipulating someone by appealing to his susceptibilities.
I know that in Saint-Hyacinthe (for the Love of God, NEVER go there!), they say this :
“une chic à tire” (pronounced in English), referring to girls who are impressed by guys with cars. Usually cheap cars. Usually 1994 Honda Civic’s with a chrome muffler.
haha amazing. I hope you will be a major contributor to this thread, Nick. And as far as the dog chasing the bus, I actually have heard the same rhetorical question in english before. Then, Gary Larson drew a cartoon with the answer in The Far Side. Bonus points if you can find the image. (I couldn’t)
Avoir la tête dans les nuages… To be distracted. Il avait la tête dans les nuages et il a traversé la rue devant une voiture.
Passer du coq à l’âne: to change subject quickly. On parlait de sa blonde quand il est arrivé, on est passé du coq à l’âne.
And the cream of the crop: se faire “enfirouaper”: to be cheated, swindled. Comes from “In fur wrapped” since the richer anglophones back in the earlier Quebec days were richer and dressed in fur, while the francophones usually wore cotton or wool.
Hahaha,
Pitoune: a dressed up chick - from the days when the woodsmen went to town for fun and women, so “happy town” became pitoune. A bit sluttier and it becomes pétasse.
HAHAHHA some are soo funny (the cow and the tits one :P)
Oh I got one!
‘En avoir plein le cul’ : (to have your ass full) can be translated as :having enough of something, being tired of something
example: Il me parlait sans arrêt et j’en avais PLEIN LE CUL
‘il pleut a boire debout’, can be translated as it’s raining so much you can drink standing. It obviously means it’s raining a lot.
‘attache ta tuque or attache tes culottes’ (tie your tuque or pants) which means be ready!
4)’ j’ai dautres chats a fouetter’ (I’ve got other cats to whip) : I.ve got other stuff to do
‘être mal baisé’ (he-she not properly fucked): he-she is in a bad mood.
Lol, these are the ones i could think right now. hahahah
péter sa coche (or péter un plomb, in france I think). To really lose it at somebody.
My ex teamate from espoirs laval à pété sa coche when somebody crashed into our best TTer on our TTT team during the warmup before we started by doing something stupid. (boy did he. I learned alot of good quebecois insults and slang that day!)