handbags at ten paces n. a verbal spat, usually between athletes on the field of play. Editorial Note: Probably related to any number of Monty Python sketches which have the actors dressed in drag, battling each other with handbags, such as in Series 1, Episode 11, “Battle of Pearl Harbor.” The Oxford English Dictionary has an entry for the broader use of handbag in related forms. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
In the 15th century, the word respair meant “to have hope again.” Although this word fell out of use, it’s among dozens collected in a new book of soothing vocabulary for troubled times. Plus, baseball slang: If a batter...
Penny in Savannah, Georgia, recalls that her father, a Navy veteran who served in the South Pacific, would say of someone who was clueless or didn’t know what he was talking about: That person doesn’t know if he’s punched, bored...