Folk phrases for *escape*

Posted by Word Camel on August 28, 2002

In Reply to: Folk phrases for *escape* posted by TheFallen on August 28, 2002

: : : : : : I wonder if anyone here knows some good folk phrases for escape from authority (be it a boy from his parents, a kid from the techers, a youth from the cops..... whatever). Eluding suppression and repression.

: : : : : : The act of escaping.

: : : : : : And, too, the condition of having escaped.

: : : : : : Thanks t'ya. Parnell

: : : : : I have several country phrase books. But none have indexes so I have to page through.

: : : : : hell and gone (n. phr. the remotest distance) ".and lit out for hell an' gone.' 'It's me for the high hills of hell an' gone)." "Smoky Mountain Voices: A Lexicon of Southern Appalachian Speech Based on the Research of Horace Kephart," edited by Harold J. Farwell Jr., and J. Karl Nicholas (University Press of Kentucky, Lexington, Ky., 1993).

: : : : : A hard dog to keep under the porch.

: : : : : Running fast: He was splittin' the mud. He took off like a scalded dog.

: : : : To run: Buck it. High-tail it. Run like wild turkeys. To outwit: outsharp. From Southern Mountain Speech by Cratis D. Williams (Berea College Press, 1992)

: : : : You can't keep a squirrel on the ground - It's futile to force someone to do something he's not naturally suited to do. From the Mountain Range section of the Facts on File Dictionary of American Regionalisms: Local Expressions from Coast to Coast by Robert Hendrickson (Facts on File, New York, 2000).

: : : People who have advanced degrees in the social sciences and live in cities would simply say he has issues with authority.

: : 'Giving the light the slip' (David Crosby, songwriter). Weaseling out. He dodged out. He skipped out. He slipped out like a greased pig. He cut and ran. He bailed. He scooted right out of there. He got off scot free.

: He went off like a bat out of Hell. He slipped out under the wire. He ran screaming for the hills. He hit the ground running. He stayed under the radar. He crept out from under the nose of. He slipped the noose. And a couple of semi-archaic Brit slang expressions - He legged it. He scarpered.

He's on the lam. He made like a candle and blew. (which makes more sense if you say "Let's make like a candle and blow")

• Folk phrases for *escape* joel 08/28/02
  • Folk phrases for *escape* rafa lesp 08/29/02