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Give a Monkey's

Posted by ESC on January 30, 2003

In Reply to: Give a Monkey's posted by James Briggs on January 29, 2003

: : Origin of the phrase "couldn't give a monkey's" ?

: : A monkey's what? Is it rhyming slang perhaps?

: : Thanks

: : Jon

: I believe it to be just another case of choosing an animal to illustrate a point - eg 'sick as a parrot', 'dog-tired'. The example is particularly crude, because I've always understood that there's a missing word, indicating that things are so trivial as to be not worth caring about. 'I don't give a monkey's f**k'.

I thought it was "a monkey's butt," from the "I don't give a rat's a**" genre.

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