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Sleep With Me
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Subject: Sleep With Me From: Peter T. Date: 19 Jun 01 - 03:27 PM One of the best written magazines in the world is the absurdly right-wing British Spectator (that the right-wing usually produces better writers than the left is a source of constant irritation to me). In this week's issue, the author of the "Mind Your Language" column, the improbably named Dot Wordsworth, goes on the hunt of "sleep with". Like me, she assumed it was a modern coinage. Not so. The earliest reference in the OED is from 900, in Alfred's Laws -- when a man "hir mid slaepe" with a woman not his wife. 100 years later, Aelfric paraphrases the story of Joseph and Potiphar's wife, when she makes a grab for him -- "His hlaefdige lufode hine, and cwaeth to him: Slap wid me!!" It turns out that this is in turn a direct translation from the Latin Vulgate -- "Dormi mecum!" She finally notes that "sleeping around" is a new addition to the OED, and is not noted before 1919. The phrase that is. yours, Peter T. |
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Subject: RE: Sleep With Me From: wysiwyg Date: 19 Jun 01 - 03:41 PM "Sleep With Me." OK! Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzsnorksnarkzzzzzzzzzzzzz..... ~S~ |
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Subject: RE: Sleep With Me From: MMario Date: 19 Jun 01 - 03:45 PM But will you respect us in the morning? |
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Subject: RE: Sleep With Me From: GUEST Date: 19 Jun 01 - 03:55 PM Human ingenuity can accomplish a lot. In Genesis I:28 God said be fruitful and multiply. Nowhere in the Bible is there a word on how. Adam (with Eve's help and encouragement) figured that out, and man and woman have been busy at it ever since, sleeping only when they're too tired to keep at it.
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Subject: RE: Sleep With Me From: GUEST,SharonA Date: 19 Jun 01 - 03:56 PM Um, no thanks. Nothing personal, you understand. How does the word origin compare with that of the King James version of the Old Testament "lay with me"? Was one a censored version of the other? |
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Subject: RE: Sleep With Me From: Matt_R Date: 19 Jun 01 - 03:57 PM Sorry, I'm bound to a code of celibacy! |
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Subject: RE: Sleep With Me From: GUEST Date: 19 Jun 01 - 04:13 PM Matt, that's not God's good work for you! |
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Subject: RE: Sleep With Me From: GUEST Date: 19 Jun 01 - 04:17 PM Didn't know there was a 0th commandment did you? |
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Subject: RE: Sleep With Me From: Rowana (at work) Date: 19 Jun 01 - 04:53 PM Sleep with you? Please, sir, I hardly know you! |
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Subject: RE: Sleep With Me From: katlaughing Date: 19 Jun 01 - 05:05 PM Peter, how very interesting. Thanks for posting this. I love etymology! I've got a nice snuggly quilt for the next time we find ourselves stuck on some blustery mountain top, battling evil villians, wiht or without Annette.:-) As for you others, turning down a nice gentleman like Peter, pshaw! Nothing wrong with a snuggle and no one said it had to be more than that! Consenting adults and all, could be either way! **BG** kat |
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Subject: RE: Sleep With Me From: mousethief Date: 19 Jun 01 - 05:18 PM Yeah, Kat, and all Potiphor's wife wanted was someone to snuggle. Alex |
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Subject: RE: Sleep With Me From: Matt_R Date: 19 Jun 01 - 05:37 PM Potiphar was cool and so fine But his wife would never toe the line It's all there in Chapter 39 of Genesis She was beautiful but evil Saw a lot of men against his will He would have to tell her that she still was his Joseph's looks and handsome figure Had attracted her attention Every morning she would beckon "Come and lie with me, love" Joseph wanted to resist her Till one day she proved too eager Joseph cried in vain "Please stop! I don't believe in free love!" |
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Subject: RE: Sleep With Me From: JenEllen Date: 19 Jun 01 - 05:47 PM LOL...Jaysus kat! My addled brain read 'entomology'. (Annette: "Chere, just what do you have in your quilt? And no monsieur, those are not pillows!) Okay, so what about great 'SLEEP' songs? Santo and Johnny's 'Sleepwalk'. ~J |
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Subject: RE: Sleep With Me From: Amergin Date: 19 Jun 01 - 05:53 PM boy, Peter here found a new way to beg for sex....I am impressed....I find though that I must turn you down...you're a little too emasculine for my taste.... |
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Subject: RE: Sleep With Me From: mousethief Date: 19 Jun 01 - 05:55 PM Sleep with me I want to be your partner Can't you see The evening is just starting Night is falling And I am calling Sleep with me... Hmmm. |
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Subject: RE: Sleep With Me From: JenEllen Date: 19 Jun 01 - 06:38 PM O are you sleepin' Maggie O are you sleepin' Maggie Let me in, for loud the linn Is roaring now o'er the warlacragie |
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Subject: RE: Sleep With Me From: Bill D Date: 19 Jun 01 - 06:40 PM ...so there was this trial in Kentucky many years ago, (I was told it was real)...a young fellow was accused of entirely too much intimacy with a girl who was much too young, and the prosecutor was having a lot of problems with the questions, since he was too 'moral' to use the vulgar forms of language. "Henry, did you have carnal knowlege of Miss Smith?" "Huh?" "What I'm trying to ask is, did you sleep with this girl?" "Ummm...not a wink, sir!" .....I believe they dismissed the case on a writ of habeus omnia euphemism |
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Subject: RE: Sleep With Me From: kendall Date: 19 Jun 01 - 06:41 PM Definition of virtue: INSUFFICIENT TEMPTATION |
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Subject: RE: Sleep With Me From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 19 Jun 01 - 06:44 PM I'd have thought that by American standards the Spectator would count as a bit liberal. |
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Subject: RE: Sleep With Me From: Peter T. Date: 19 Jun 01 - 07:06 PM The best thing about the Spectator is that there is something amusing about the "nutty toffs" agenda, which is quite different from the Yankee "lockn'load" variety. Just distance I guess. "Two Sleepy People" is a nice sleep with me but I am awake kind of song. yours, Peter T. |
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Subject: RE: Sleep With Me From: Amos Date: 19 Jun 01 - 08:45 PM I think most people find that the most exhilerating sexual fulfillment is often shortly a world-class soporific, and I imagine that's been true since before Abraham's day! A |
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Subject: RE: Sleep With Me From: JenEllen Date: 20 Jun 01 - 02:31 AM Forgot about that one! It's perfect...
Well here we are just above the Seine |
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