The newsletter just went out! I sent it manually (read: painfully) and one batch went out without a subject (*hits head on table repeatedly*) - so if you received one of those, my abject apologies. I thought it was better to just apologize here then to resend it with the subject in place.

If you didn’t receive the newsletter, I have an htm version up at: http://www.annemallory.com/AprilNewsletter.htm

I’m going to be looking at better sending methods, or perhaps moving to a Yahoo Group. The next newsletter won’t go out until late October, so there’s some time to decide.

1811 Vulgar Tongue

To beat the hoof; to travel on foot. He hoofed itor beat the hoof, every step of the way from Chester to London.

Merriam-Webster

Walk : kick, trample : to move on the feet; especially : dance

1811 Vulgar Tongue

Vulgar appellation for the feet. You have leftthe marks of your dirty hocks on my clean stairs; a frequentcomplaint from a mop squeezer to a footman.

Merriam-Webster

1 : the tarsal joint or region in the hind limb of a digitigrade quadruped (as the horse) corresponding to the human ankle but elevated and bending backward : a joint of a fowl’s leg that corresponds to the hock of a quadruped
2 : a small cut of meat from a front or hind leg just above the foot

1811 Vulgar Tongue

An irregular mixture of numerous things.

Merriam-Webster

A heterogeneous mixture : jumble

Not to be confused with modge podge, a good decoupage glue.

Whoohoo! Book release day is here and I’m doing a jig.

1811 Vulgar Tongue

A romping girl. (Written as hoydon not hoyden)

The Free Dictionary

A high-spirited, boisterous, or saucy girl.

1811 Vulgar Tongue

A noise, riot, or disturbance.

The Free Dictionary

Loud noise; din. : Confusion; tumult.

The April contest is masquerading as a Spring contest by starting in March.

Read the new excerpt and answer the contest question to win a chance for a $15 gift certificate to Amazon!
New long excerpt!

This is the last day to enter the March contest for the advanced reading copies of The Viscount’s Wicked Ways. New contest for a $15 Amazon gift certificate will begin soon and go through April!

Half a man and half a boy, a lad between both.

–From the 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue.

Half man, half goat. Wait, wrong word…

In Merriam-Webster this is listed as hobbledehoy (the awkward youth, not the goat).

Will you hob or nob with me? A question formerly in fashion at polite tables, signifying a request or challenge to drink a glass of wine with the proposer: if the party challenged answered Nob, they were to chuse whether white or red. This foolish custom is said to have originated in the days of good queen Bess, thus: when great chimnies were in fashion, there was at each corner of the hearth, or grate, a small elevated projection, called the hob; and behind it a seat. In winter time the beer was placed on the hob to warm: and the cold beer was set on a small table, said to have been called the nob; so that the question, Will you have hob or nob? seems only to have meant, Will you have warm or cold beer? i.e. beer from the hob, or beer from the nob.

–From the 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue.

Merriam-Webster — hobnob

To drink sociably : to associate familiarly

It is high water, with him; he is full of money.

–From the 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue.

1811 Vulgar Tongue

Confusedly mixed.

Merriam-Webster

In a confused, disordered, or random manner