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"there's no flies on him"

Posted by Bob on August 04, 2005

In Reply to: "There's no flies on him" posted by Brian from Shawnee on August 03, 2005

: : My mother in law has just come out with the phrase "there's no flies on him" Does any one know what this phrase means or where it came from ??

: Somebody at Word-detective.com posted this back in 2000: 'In the 19th century, to say that "there are no flies on him" of somebody meant that the person was alert and active, probably by allusion to cattle that move around enough to deny flies a landing place.'

: Makes sense.

I dimly remember there was a song which began (perhaps was entitled) "There's flies on me, there's flies on you, but there ain't no flies on Jesus." For all that's worth.

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