Re: As Tight as a Tick

In Reply to: Re: As Tight as a Tick posted by RRC on August 26, 2009 at 14:41:

: : : As Tight as a Tick... I'm not seeing the origins of this saying. I'm under the impression this came from U.S. The 'South' to be precise. It means to tighten the 'ticking' on a bed before sleeping in it. The 'ticking' being the strap that runs in a zigzag pattern under the mattress. This was explained at a tour of a plantation in Atlanta, Georgia. Is this in fact where this comes from?

: : I was thinking it referred to tick as in blood-sucking insect. At least one reference agrees with me. "Extremely close with one's money. If you have ever tried to separate a tick from an animal or some person's skin, you know what 'tight.' is. Sometimes the phrase has served to mean 'drunk.'..." "The Dictionary of Cliches" by James Rogers (Wings Books, Originally New York: Facts on File Publications, 1985). Page 265. I've heard it said in regards to someone who is stuffed after a meal.

: Tour guides are a notoriously bad source of word origins.
: The drunk and full meanings to my thinking are more related to how they eat/drink blood until they blow up until their skin is tight like a balloon rather than how tightly they hold on.
: In regards to bedding, ticking is the fabric used to cover a mattress or pillow and a tick is a light mattress (covered in ticking obviously) - sort of a cross between a pillow and a duvet - usually stuffed with feathers/down. You put them on top of another mattress to get the same effect as the modern "pillowtop mattress". If it gets really cold, you can even sleep underneath it. It is more commonly known in modern times as a featherbed. I suppose the ad men weren't too thrilled with the idea of pitching "Hi, I'm Barney the Bedbug here to tell you about Acme Sleeptight Ticks." ;-)
: See:
: http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=ticking
: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Featherbed
: http://www.bedbathandbeyond.com/stylePage.asp?RN=560

Just for interest: here in Rightpondia, you can be "tight" with your money, and a close call can be "tight", but "tight as a tick" is used *only* to mean "drunk". (VSD)