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Original poster

You daft apeth

416 replies

Kasterborous · 30/10/2013 08:50

No, not you but I heard this phrase yesterday and haven't heard it for ages. We used to say it when anyone had done something daft, but in a lighthearted way.

Another old favourite is 'crosspatch' as in 'don't be a crosspatch' when someone is being -well - cross.

OP posts:
MadonnaKebab · 01/11/2013 23:21

I think the Piffy on a Rockbun one is
Puffin on a rock

Quangle · 01/11/2013 22:44

my grandma used to say that "bread and pullet" thing - I never really knew what it meant beyond the notion that there wasn't anything very exciting for dinner.

BeckAndCall · 01/11/2013 15:16

YerDaftApeth - will I'm from the East Riding and we do talk our own dialect out there!!

ShriekingGnawer · 01/11/2013 15:05

GigiDarcy - it's not 'swings in roundabouts' it's 'swings AND roundabouts'. As in, it all evens out in the end, what we make on the swings we lose on the roundabouts.

This thread is great. My mum said 'get a wiggle on'. Dad used to threaten to marmalise or spiflicate us. I use the same on my kids. And threaten to defenestrate them.

KissesBreakingWave · 01/11/2013 14:53

If brains were dynamite, he'd not have enough to blow his own hat off.

(I'm actually coming back here and reposting them as I hear them.)

YerDaftApeth · 01/11/2013 14:10

'Put big light on' was another one.

'Take your coat off, or you won't feel the benefit when you go outside'.

These have already been mentioned up thread, we used them a lot in our house.

YerDaftApeth · 01/11/2013 14:07

Eau I'd forgotten about 'if wit were shit, you'd be constipated' it's a good one.

BeckAndCall it is ha'porth I just always heard it as apeth. I'm from Yorkshire, think it was used a lot there.

DH says 'trunky want a bun'

Thymeout · 01/11/2013 13:59

Short arms, long pockets - someone who's tight with the cash.

Mumpers - people who time their visits to coincide with mealtimes.

Sew your clothes on your back, you'll end up in the workhouse. (I guess because it's lazy not to take the garment off and mend hem/sew on button properly.)

In my family, it was 'What's for dinner? Bread and pullet.' Pullet is a sort of chicken, a capon?

A drama-llama was 'Sarah' - after Sarah Siddons.

Annanias (or shortened to Annani) when I was suspected of telling lies.

DwellsUndertheSink · 01/11/2013 13:57

my granny used to say:

"patience is a virtue
Virtue is a Grace
Grace is a little girl who didnt wash her face"

also, if one burped...

"Pardon Mrs Harden, there's a sparrow in your garden"

Artus · 01/11/2013 13:29

Someone day dreaming - Stood there like Joe Lock i'the park! (A statue in a park in Barnsley!)

My Grandma when asked for something e.g an expensive toy "You can have it when my ship comes in"

Corygal · 01/11/2013 13:17

My mum, who is very posh and old, frequently bewails the poor quality of clothes these days. Of course we were on the top of a bus when she pulled off a loose button and announced "What a really frightful blow job".

When I protested, she claimed that 'blow job' is army slang for a bad bit of work. Never have I heard this from anyone else, filthy old bitch is my sainted mother.Grin

goodasitgets · 01/11/2013 13:04

When I asked why?
Because Y isn't a Z
Confused

squishee · 01/11/2013 13:02

This thread is great. Glad it's in Classics.

Dadisms from the 80s (me Dad was from Up North):

Pack it in!

Blast!

Pocks on it!

And yep,

Yer daft ha'peth.

We'd get pop delivered in glass bottles in the run-up to Crimbo. Dandelion and Burdock was a favourite.

Lovecat · 01/11/2013 12:57

We also had (courtesy of our Glaswegian Brown Owl)

Those that ask, don't get
Those that don't ask, don't want.

Lovecat · 01/11/2013 12:56

Yes, Clary, my mum used to say that one too!

Sazzle, we used to say 'spied ya!' or just 'spy!' when we were kids if we'd caught someone out, but I never realised it came from "spied yer arse", as I never heard anyone say the full version...

I think that the Hesperus was a ship that ran aground and broke apart.

And I vaguely remember being told many years ago that Piffy on a Rockbun was a corruption of Patience on a Monument (ie a statue), but how one got corrupted into the other I don't know!

BeckAndCall · 01/11/2013 12:54

Without going through all 13 pages - did anyone give the correction derivation of Apeth yet?

It's correctly written as Ha'apeth - an abbreviation of the 'half penny worth' or shortened to 'ha'penny worth'. Meaning, of course, less than a full penny worth - being a bit dim!

all those years of listening to the grandparents talking in riddles seems to have been leading just to this moment Grin

EauPeanUpTheGatesOfHell · 01/11/2013 12:47

Sod that for a game of soldiers.

If wit were shit you'd be constipated.

We also used to get the offer of a 'knuckle sandwich'

GemmaTeller · 01/11/2013 12:45

'sweating balls of whitewash' Hmm

clary · 01/11/2013 12:35

Ooh yes an old colleague of mine used to say "well, this won't get the baby a new bonnet".

I still say it to indicate I need to get on with some chores/work etc instead of sitting about. Not that I ever do that

themidwife · 01/11/2013 12:35

And "She couldn't stop a pig in an entry!" about someone with bandy legs!! Grin

themidwife · 01/11/2013 12:33

"Well this won't knit the baby a new hat!" & "Where was I when the bed broke?" - things my Yorkshire Nan used to say. GrinGrinGrin

tiggyhop · 01/11/2013 12:22

Heavens to Betsey ?...

KissesBreakingWave · 01/11/2013 10:07

"All my eye and Betty Martin" comes from "Ora mihi Beata Martin" - Pray for me Saint Martin. Patron of soldiers.

GemmaTeller · 01/11/2013 08:59

flatiron we used to be 'giddy kippers' Smile

flatiron · 31/10/2013 23:50

At school, if people were asking nosy questions, the usual response was "Trunky want a bun?", while doing the elephant sign with your arm flapping in front of your nose!