After our conversation about jinx and the verbal games that ensue when two people accidentally say the same word at the same time, a Kansas listener shared this ditty she heard as a youngster: Jinx! Buy me a coke / Inky pinky stinky winky / Flush it down the toilet sinky / Allay hoo, allay hoo / King of France wet his pants /Right in the middle of the ballroom dance/ Nee nee nee nee nee / Nee nee nee nee nee nee nee UH! This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “Inky Pinky Stinky Winky”
Grant, remember the call with Ann and her daughter Amina?
They called about the word jinx and that little game that you play when two people accidentally say the same thing simultaneously.
Oh, yeah.
Sometimes you count and then say that you owe each other something or the other person owes you something like a Coke or a coconut.
Or sometimes there’s wishing involved or maybe hooking pinky fingers.
Right.
So, what, you’ve got an update?
There’s something new in the Jinx universe?
There is.
We got a voicemail from Sarah Krug who grew up in central Kansas, and she said that when she was growing up, they had a much more elaborate version.
It went, Jinx, buy me a Coke, inky, pinky, stinky, winky, flush it down the toilet, stinky, allay, who, allay, who, king of France, wet his pants, right in the middle of the ballroom dance.
Na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na.
That’s a mix of so many different childhood rhymes and songs.
I can, oh, you could just break that down.
There’s like an etymological, like, history there.
Oh, there sure is, because there are different versions of this.
I started looking around on the internet, and there are versions of this.
I think there’s a doctorate in there for the right scholar.
Well, I needed something to do on Thursday nights.
Now I have something.
We’d love childhood rhymes, whether your childhood was yesterday or not quite yesterday.
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