A Long Day's Journal Into Night

I like to ask people, especially engineers, what they would like to be if they weren't doing insert job here ?

I think it is is fascinating and people often surprise me.

Usually, when asked, I would say children's librarian, but today I was thinking linguist.

I don't know what a linguist does exactly, but I have more than a passing interest in language. Working among non-native speakers is especially interesting for me. For example, one time, a Korean friend said he thought that the song "Take my Breath Away," of pre-crazy Tom Cruise Top Gun fame, was so sad. Why? Well, because he thought that literally the singer's breath was being taken away, or that the singer was dying. And who can blame him for thinking that? Sometimes I can clarify these types of phrases for people. For example, it is easy for me to explain that "taking one's breath away," means that you make one gasp (though not necessarily literally) in shock or awe. Sometimes I have no way of explaining these phrases. I just take the meaning for granted, as though it is its own word, and I have no idea of the origin.

So today, I was listening to a podcast and the phrase "hands down" was used. The meaning in the little dictionary I carry around in my head is: absolutely, no question, or no doubt. But imagine you are a newbie to English language. Suddenly the phrase "hands down" seems baffleing.

So if you are baffled like me, here is an explanation I found on Ask Yahoo!
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"Hands down" is a term meaning "easily" or "with little or no effort." It's used most often in the context of a competition or comparison, as in the sentence "Filthy Rich: Cattle Drive is hands-down the most significant cultural event of the last decade." (Editors' Note: Sentence used for demonstration purposes only.)

We stumbled upon several wrong guesses, but just about all the etymological sites we came across agreed that the term dates back to the mid-19th century and the genteel world of British horse racing. Back then, a jockey who found himself way ahead as he approached the finish line would relax his grip on the reins and drop his hands. Not as confrontational as a spiked football, but still a bit of gestural in-your-face-ness. By the late 19th century, the idiom had been extended to non-racing contexts, and it remains in frequent use today.
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