Discussion Groups / English Usage / July 2009

PHTE set the following eddies spiralling through the space-time continuum:

So if I ever go to southern California - and it rains - I can't sue the
songwriter?

The song , originally called "Meet me in St. Louis, Louis", is
actually about forty years older than the movie.  Wikipedia has the
lyrics:

Verse 1
When Louis came home to the flat
He hung up his coat and his hat
He gazed all around
But no wifey he found
So he said, "Where can Flossie be at?"
A note on the table he spied
He read it just once, then he cried
It ran, "Louis, dear,"
"It's too slow for me here,"
"So I think I will go for a ride..."

[edit] Verse 2
The dresses that hung in the hall
Were gone, she had taken them all
She took all his rings
And the rest of his things
The picture he missed from the wall
"What, moving?" the janitor said
"Your rent is paid three months ahead!"
"What good is the flat?"
Said poor Louis, "Read that!"
And the janitor smiled as he read...

[edit] Chorus
Meet me in St. Louis, Louis,
Meet me at the Fair
Don't tell me the lights are shining
Anyplace but there
We will dance the "Hoochie-Koochie"
I will be your "Tootsie-Wootsie"
If you will meet me in St. Louis, Louis,
Meet me at the Fair.

[edit] Verse 3
Lew Woods was the name of a horse,
that ran at the New Orleans course,
I played him one day
for a dollar each way,
and I charged it to profit and loss;
He started to run in the wet,
the son of a gun's running yet,
That crazy old skate,
he made straight for the gate,
and I hollered, "Hey Lew! don't forget."

[edit] Verse 4
There came to the gay tenderloin,
a Jay who had money to burn,
The poor simple soul
showed a girlie his roll,
and she said, "for some wine dear, I yearn."
A bottle and bird right away,
she touched him then said, "I can't stay."
He sighed, "Tell me, sweet,
where can you and I meet?"
and the orchestra started to play.

[edit] Verse 5
The clerks in the bank said, "It's queer,
did anyone see the cashier?
It's way after time,
and we haven't a dime,
we can't open the safe 'till he's here."
The President shook his gray head,
"Send out for an expert," he said,
The door's opened wide,
not a cent was inside,
just a card, that was all, and it read:

[edit] Verse 6
In church sat a man near the door,
asleep, he was starting to snore,
The Minister rose,
and he said, "We will close
singing, Meet on the Beautiful Shore."
The man in the back then awoke,
he caught the last words that he spoke;
He said, "Parson White,
you can meet me alright,
but The Beautiful Shore is a joke."Verse 1
When Louis came home to the flat
He hung up his coat and his hat
He gazed all around
But no wifey he found
So he said, "Where can Flossie be at?"
A note on the table he spied
He read it just once, then he cried
It ran, "Louis, dear,"
"It's too slow for me here,"
"So I think I will go for a ride..."

[edit] Verse 2
The dresses that hung in the hall
Were gone, she had taken them all
She took all his rings
And the rest of his things
The picture he missed from the wall
"What, moving?" the janitor said
"Your rent is paid three months ahead!"
"What good is the flat?"
Said poor Louis, "Read that!"
And the janitor smiled as he read...

[edit] Chorus
Meet me in St. Louis, Louis,
Meet me at the Fair
Don't tell me the lights are shining
Anyplace but there
We will dance the "Hoochie-Koochie"
I will be your "Tootsie-Wootsie"
If you will meet me in St. Louis, Louis,
Meet me at the Fair.

[edit] Verse 3
Lew Woods was the name of a horse,
that ran at the New Orleans course,
I played him one day
for a dollar each way,
and I charged it to profit and loss;
He started to run in the wet,
the son of a gun's running yet,
That crazy old skate,
he made straight for the gate,
and I hollered, "Hey Lew! don't forget."

[edit] Verse 4
There came to the gay tenderloin,
a Jay who had money to burn,
The poor simple soul
showed a girlie his roll,
and she said, "for some wine dear, I yearn."
A bottle and bird right away,
she touched him then said, "I can't stay."
He sighed, "Tell me, sweet,
where can you and I meet?"
and the orchestra started to play.

[edit] Verse 5
The clerks in the bank said, "It's queer,
did anyone see the cashier?
It's way after time,
and we haven't a dime,
we can't open the safe 'till he's here."
The President shook his gray head,
"Send out for an expert," he said,
The door's opened wide,
not a cent was inside,
just a card, that was all, and it read:

[edit] Verse 6
In church sat a man near the door,
asleep, he was starting to snore,
The Minister rose,
and he said, "We will close
singing, Meet on the Beautiful Shore."
The man in the back then awoke,
he caught the last words that he spoke;
He said, "Parson White,
you can meet me alright,
but The Beautiful Shore is a joke."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meet_Me_in_St._Louis,_Louis

The language is certainly intended, as Don says, to convey a certain
ambiance and attitude, but I would call it raffishly proletarian
rather than rural.

I came across the article while looking unsuccessfully for the line
that Arne asked about.  Then I looked again at his post and saw that
he had said it was in another song from that musical, or maybe from
that book of songs.  Since I didn't think that I had anything useful
to add to what had already been said, I gave up the search at that
point.

Except that the song "Meet Me in St Louis" doesn't include any reference to
having your picture took and, as I suggested elsethread, none of the other
songs in the musical do either. I'm offering "Hello Dolly" for the source of
those lyrics.

Other, of course, than Hattie herself who had been playing maid / cook
characters to the same template for the best part of a decade in over a
dozen movies. As long as he'd seen a couple or three of those, he knew what
was wanted. Indeed, he could have written the part in standard English and
relied on Hattie to do the business with the dialect and accent.
As she was the child of former slaves, one wonders whence Hattie drew her
standard 'maid' character. Certainly, she was quoted as saying "I loved
Mammy, I think I understood her because my own grandmother worked on a
plantation not unlike Tara".

Maybe it's just me, but I thought it referred more to a box camera...

[...]

It seems a little earthy to say that to a child, especially back in
the day.  I would have taken it for a reference to mug shots.

Richard Chambers filted:

My response to such a headline would be "slow news day"...if you want to panic
*me* with an animal-related story, mention that someone's allowing packs of
geese to run around freely...popular scare stories here concern either rabid
bats (the ten-year-old children of the animal kingdom; their very mobility
allows them a lot of opportunities to both contract and spread disease) or
swarming bees....

Which leads me to wonder about our relationship with bees in general...a whole
industry exists whereby humans take extraordinary precautions against these
dangerous creatures while encouraging them to collect nearby our own
settlements, just so we can steal the fruits of their labor...who was it, I
wonder, that first risked stinging to discover that they're hoarding sticky
sweets?...and could that discovery have had some impact on the legends of
dragons hoarding treasure?...r