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Fell off the roof

Posted by R. Berg on January 10, 2001

In Reply to: Fell off the roof posted by JoAnn Turtle on January 09, 2001

: My Aunt who came from England used this phrase for two meanings . Sometimes it was hard to figure out exactly what she was intending fof it to mean . One meaning was that the person was or went nuts , while the other meaning was that a female had entered her period . Im searching for the origin . Thanks for any time you can give to this .

Eric Partridge, Dictionary of Catch Phrases: American and British, from the Sixteenth Century to the Present Day, identifies "I've (just) fallen off the roof" as "a US feminine expression meaning 'I've (just) started my period' and part-euph. said to a friend or a husband; late, perhaps mid-, [19th to 20th century], but by c. 1960 no longer used." He doesn't identify the origin or give the "going nuts" meaning. The "Dictionary of American Slang" doesn't have the expression at all.

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