On the Flip Side

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, is this Martha?

This is Martha. Who’s this?

Hi, Martha. It’s Vicki. I am calling from New York City.

So what’s on your mind, Vicki?

Well, I was curious about the phrase, catch you on the flip side.

I do know what that means.

However, I didn’t really hear it that much growing up.

And recently I was watching some YouTube videos, and someone uses that as, like, their exit.

You know, that brought that, reintroduced me to that phrase, and I wanted to look into the origins of it, and I did, but I was curious if either of you have more information to share.

So it means, what does it mean when someone is leaving the room and they say, catch on the flip side?

It just means, like, see you later.

Yeah, hasta la vista, right?

Mm—

Yeah.

And so you looked into it, you went to Mr. Google and asked Mr. Google some questions, and what did Mr. Google tell you?

A few possibilities, well, a couple of possibilities.

One is that it could be from DJs.

You know, when they did record spinning on the radio, it was their way of saying, you know, see you later.

And another possibility is truckers on, you know, Citizens Band Radio.

They would say that when they were going out of range sort of to see you on the return trip.

And then with the DJ record spinning, it’s because you would flip the record to the other side.

Yeah, those stories are mostly how I would put it, but I would phrase it a little differently.

I don’t have any written evidence that DJs ever said catch you on the flip side, but I do know that 45s in particular, the B-side was called the flip side.

So the hit was on the A-side of the record, and then the B-side was like the secondary song.

And so that was the flip side.

However, catch you on the flipside doesn’t appear in print as far as I know, and I have really looked, until 1976 when this whole trucker trucking fad happened.

CB Radio caught the imagination of the American public and catch you on the flipside is exactly as you put it.

It means I will see you on my return trip because many long-haul trucks are like you go out, you deliver your goods, and you come back with new goods.

You come back with an empty, and you just repeat this on the same route.

So if you’re on the CB radio, you’re running into the same people on the radio over and over, depending where you are.

Right.

And it wasn’t just truckers.

I mean, my handle was in my little Datsun B210.

My handle was Honeybee because they had Honeybee on the side.

So I was like, break it one night and you got the one Honeybee.

And then catch on the, we would say catch on the flip-flop.

Catch on the flip-flop.

I’ve heard that one too.

I’ve heard of that one.

Yeah, I didn’t do CB radio until I was in college.

So I was a college boy.

That was me.

Okay.

What’s your 20?

Yeah.

Where are you?

So, yeah.

But the thing is that once the trucker fad faded, so did most of the trucker slang.

People will still kind of know it.

Like 10-4 in particular was kind of known through cop shows, but really kind of imprinted itself on American lingo from the CB craze.

It was strange to see catch you on the flipside resurge in the late 90s.

I don’t know why it did, but it shows up in the late 90s again.

It kind of comes back in the early 2000s, pops up here and there.

Urban Dictionary has entries for it.

And just like you, Vicki, I have run into people who are in their late teens and early 20s who write it, and they probably say it aloud, too, as if it’s their own, as if it’s not something that’s got like a 40- or 50-year history to it.

Right, right.

Yeah, because it definitely feels older to me.

So I was sort of surprised when I heard this YouTuber using it, because she’s definitely of a younger generation.

She’s like in her probably early 20s.

So, yeah.

Nothing to flip.

One of the Urban Dictionary books, there’s like two or three Urban Dictionary books that are published from the website.

One of them includes Quechua on the flip side with no historical references.

And I always have wondered if there are some people who are trying to stay hip to the slang picked it up from that book.

I don’t know.

It’s a long shot.

But it is strange.

Like the increased use of whatnot is another one of those things, which is so old-fashioned.

Or legit, when the kids in high school and grade school say that’s legit, meaning cool or good, and that’s something with a 30-year history behind it, and they don’t even know.

Cool, right?

Yeah, I didn’t know that about those other two words, that there’s more history behind them.

But there’s nothing stopping a word from coming back, but the pathways by which they do it for each word can be very different.

Thanks, Vicki.

We really appreciate your call.

Yeah, definitely.

Thank you guys so much.

Take care.

I really appreciate your help.

Sure, Vicki.

Bye-bye.

Take care.

Bye.

Bye-bye.

But I’m interested in what you said about whatnot because I’m starting to associate that with sort of hipster types.

Is that where you hear it?

Because it’s so old.

Well, you and I have read the same emails and listened to the same voicemails from people who’ve contacted the show who are like, wait a second.

What is it with whatnot?

And I’ve noticed it myself.

It is so old.

It’s kind of a catch-all meaning and everything or and stuff, right?

And whatnot.

Yeah, we went to the grocery store and we got the eggs and the bacon and whatnot, right?

Yeah.

But it’s so interesting to see it come back, this old-fashioned word.

Right.

It’s sort of this self-conscious kind of.

Do you think it’s self-conscious?

It feels performance-y to me.

Oh, okay.

What not?

I wonder if it’s past that now, where it’s just now caught on.

And what not.

Yeah.

Past the few people who were performing it as they brought a word back.

It’s weird.

Well, I’m looking at the dictionary.

It looks like it goes back to at least the mid-16th century.

That’s awesome.

But there’s nothing stopping a word from coming back, right?

Nothing.

There’s nothing new under the sun, right?

And if you want to find out how far back under the sun your thing goes, give us a call, 877-929-9673, or tell us an email, words@waywordradio.org.