tit in a wringer

This is the last survivor of one of many "Haven't heard anything like that since Grandma (Grandpa) ..." expressions that used to mean someone was overdramatizing their problems. Implied the person commented on was acting like a whiny old person. "Haven't heard anything like that since Granny got her tit caught in the wringer" was what you'd say when, e.g., a coworkers spent the morning complaining about someone having taken the last cup of coffee and not making a fresh pot.
"And everyone forgot to tell me that Awards Day is next week! Why doesn't anyone ever tell me? Doesn't anyone care ...." etc.

(whispered to friend) "Haven't heard anything like that since Granny caught her tit in a wringer."

(Alternatives that once were common) "Haven't heard anything like that since someone put a cherry bomb in Grandpa's truss."

"Haven't heard anything like that since Granny sat on the toilet plunger."

"Haven't heard anything like that since Grandpa got a turd stuck sideways."
by old lang guy September 09, 2006
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Slang among political ops for "I am looking for dirt on your candidate." May or may not be connected to the classic line from The Godfather: "Clemenza sleeps with the fish." Meaning he's been whacked, per orders. So "Fishing for your Goombas," maybe, started out meaning "looking for the bodies in your candidate's background." (Classically such bodies would be a live boy or a dead girl).
"Hey, what's this bullshit with a guy with a camera in the parking lot at four in the morning?"

"I am fishing for your Goombas, asshole. If your boy can't keep it zipped, the people got a right to know."
by old lang guy October 14, 2006
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gorilla

The big goon you take along when you think the other party may want to get rough (or when you are trying to intimidate them). Large, ugly, and not prone to smiling, at least not nicely. Sometimes heard as gorilla up.
I gotta get my security deposit back from that asshole, he was supposed to split it to all the roommates, so I need to take along a gorilla.

If you really need to talk to that one, better gorilla up. Sam'll go along if you ask him.
by old lang guy September 08, 2006
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slow burn

Gradual but inexorable increase in anger, eventually becoming outright rage or fury; what happens as a patient or slow-witted person figures out what has happened and why it is significant. NOT the insult, but the process that the insult (or other upsetting thing) starts in the victim.
"Beware the fury of a patient man" -- Seneca was talking about the consequences of a slow burn here.

At first Ned liked to think his new girlfriend was popular, but as that progressed to flirty, and then to "widely available even when Ned was right there", he began to do a slow burn about it; finding her topless in the kitchen at a party was the last straw.

She did a slow burn over the fact that her roommate borrowed things, didn't return them, gradually assumed she owned them, and finally began to lend them out and give them away herself.

He dented my car and at first it was no big deal; I left a note on his windshield saying we'd figure out what to do about it, but when I didn't hear from him for months, except promises that we'd get in touch real soon, I started to do a slow burn.
by old lang guy December 11, 2008
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monkey fuck

Shortened version of the backstage expression "That looked like a monkey fucking a football" -- i.e. "Oh, wow, that was so godawful awkward and stupid that I had to stare at it." Among stage crew and roadies, a monkey fuck is not just any mistake or accident. It's something that you couldn't possibly avoid that forces you to look really stupid in front of a large audience.
"I hear load-in took a while."

"Oh, shit, they got us carts but they were two inches too wide for the passageway, and they only gave us half a crew because we had carts, and the band just got these new super expensive amps, so we had to hand carry them and not bump or drop them, and then the loading dock door jammed so we were carrying them through the front lobby, four house guys on an amp, all bent over like hunchbacks, with a roadie following us and screaming to be careful, and everyone in line buying tickets laughing at us. It was a total monkey fuck."
by old lang guy February 19, 2008
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tits up

Show biz slang for hyper positive attitude. From the legendary rallying cry of the lead chorine for Broadway shows, just before they go on stage -- "Tits up, girls!" Usually an adjective -- a tits up attitude, taking the tits up approach, they want someone who's totally tits up for the job.
Everything is going to shit but my boss is so tits up I may have to kill him.

They want to see a lot of tits up attitude this quarter, when the new product rolls out.
by old lang guy October 17, 2006
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Work Songs

Also songs used when people needed to work in rhythm. Many are familiar folk songs. Like

--sea chanteys where the lead singer's solo line would get everyone set, and then they'd all sing (and therefore exhale) when they put out their effort pulling on a line.

-- field hollers that were used to keep lines hoeing a field up with each other. (And field hollers, speeded up and with some rhythm and some guitar added, might have been one of the origins of the blues, and thus of most American popular music since 1920)

-- capstan chanteys that kept people pretty much walking in the same rhythm while they turned giant cranks.

Very often work songs were subversive, making fun of the boss, complaining about the conditions, and sometimes carrying instructions for prison breaks, union organizing, or the Underground Railroad.
Work songs examples:

Sea chantey,

Leader (while the end man belays, and everyone walks up the line and gets a grip): Reuben was no sailor ...

Crew (Singing while they pull the line back): Ranzo, boys ranzo!

(later in the song it turns out Reuben is now the captain ...)

Field holler ...

Leader: (while the crew picks up their hammers, stretches, and gets ready to swing): When Israel was in Egypt land ...

Crew (hitting on the drills on let, peop, and go): LET MY PEOPLE GO!

Capstan chantey, used to turn the winch to move the locks on the canal ...

Leader (while crew breathe and get set): I got a mule, her name is Sal ...

Crew (Walking forward, pushing on the capstan bars): FIFTEEN MILES ON THE ERIE CANAL!
by old lang guy September 23, 2006
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