Call Me a Biscuit

Hi, you have A Way with Words.

Hi there, Martha. Hi, Grant.

Hey, what’s up?

This is Kurt Basham from Grand Rapids.

I was calling about a funny phrase that I’ve heard from time to time.

Yeah?

And the phrase varies a little bit, depending on who’s saying it, but the basic gist of it, the most common version is something like, well, shut my mouth and call me Shirley.

Okay.

And it’s said best, I think, with kind of a southern accent, you know. Martha, if you want to give that a whirl.

Like Flo from Mills Diner, right?

Yeah.

Well, shut my mouth and call me Shirley.

How’s that?

Perfect.

Is this from television or movies? Where are you hearing this scene?

I don’t think I’ve ever heard anybody in real life actually say it. It’s maybe a little too colorful for that, but I have heard it on TV and movies from time to time.

Colorful, usually a southern character, when somebody says something kind of surprising to him, that’s what he would say, or some variation of it.

I Googled around, and I found some other variations on it, too.

Yeah? Yeah, let’s hear them.

Well, strip my gears and call me shiftless.

Strip my gears and call me shiftless.

Feed me nails and call me rusty.

And I think my favorite is, well, love me tender and call me Elvis.

Oh, yeah, nice. Very good.

And so your question is where these come from, or you just want to call and share some funny stuff?

A little of both.

I’d love to, you know, if some listeners out there have some other great ones, I’d love to hear them. But I was curious about the origin of it.

They’re all really interesting.

You found the shiftless one. The earliest use I found for that is, you know, strip my gears and call me shiftless is from the 1940s.

And this whole kind of construction will do X to me and then call me Y dates to the 1940s.

Oh, yeah?

Yeah, the lexicographer Eric Partridge in his catchphrase’s dictionary suggested that it came from Phil Harris, who was Jack Benny’s bandleader.

And they would often write really colorful language for him for the show, tame stuff by modern standards, but just wacky with all kinds of invented slang and new words and one-offs and jives and jokes.

And he was a ladies’ man, and he was a player and a playboy, and that was the character that they created for him.

Phil Harris was one of the great characters of old-time radio, and still you’ll find Phil Harris in modern movies, only not by that name.

It’s the same kind of guy, that same stereotype.

In any case, he had one, well, cut off my legs and call me shorty. He used variations on this all the time.

There’s some suggestion by Eric Partridge. Again, he was a British slang lexicographer who suggests that it mixed a little bit with another catchphrase.

Well, shut my mouth, which is an expression of surprise. If somebody says something like, we’re getting a divorce, you’re like, well, shut my mouth.

And it’s related to the modern shut up. We’ve talked about that on the program before.

And so Phil Harris was on a national radio show. He was known throughout the country. Everybody knew who Phil Harris was.

I mean, who would you compare him today?

I don’t know. I mean, even more common than Jay Leno’s bandleader, right?

Well, would it be like Ed McMahon?

Yeah, it’d be more like Doc Severinsen. Everybody knew who Phil Harris was.

And pretty much most of the country, if they didn’t listen to him, they at least heard his one-liners the next day at the office or at school.

Would he say things like, put juice in my glass and call me Phil?

I don’t know about that, but that’s a pretty good one.

Thank you.

So it caught on really quickly, early 1940s, 1940, 1941. They start popping up in song titles.

They show up in a list of sub-deb slang in Boys’ Life. Sub-debs were a name for debutantes, like young debutante girls.

Sub-deb? You mean they haven’t made their debut yet?

Yeah, exactly. Sub-debs.

So in Boys’ Life, you know, it was the magazine for young boys that had a list of slang. So you see this catch on like almost immediately, and then people started improvising on the construction, right?

We love to do that kind of thing.

Yeah, we do that in English all the time. These are called snow clones. We find a structure and we emulate that structure.

So you mentioned a couple. Another one that I’ve seen often is Butter My Butt and Call Me a Biscuit.

So it’s been going strong for 60, 70 years. And maybe it goes back to this Phil guy.

Phil Harris, yeah, the band leader for Jack Benny on The Jack Benny Show.

Well, rub my belly and call me Buddha.

Nice.

Take care.

Nice.

Thanks for calling, Kurt.

Thanks, Kurt.

Bye-bye.

Nice.

If you’ve got some more of these, well, do X to me and call me Y, give us a call, 877-929-9673, or send the whole lot of them an email to words@waywordradio.org.