To Thread - Forum Home

The Mudcat Café TM
https://mudcat.org/thread.cfm?threadid=92139
89 messages

BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?

11 Jun 06 - 08:35 PM (#1757558)
Subject: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Little Hawk

I've been wondering about this ever since Junior High School, and that was a long time ago. People would say "Get Bent!", and I'd wonder what the hell that was supposed to mean. Seriously. Does it mean, "bend over and assume the position (sexual)" or does it refer to the mind being bent, as in a drug experience?

Does anyone know for sure? Spaw? Anyone?


11 Jun 06 - 08:37 PM (#1757560)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: number 6

I dunno LH ... in my juniour high they said the standard "go f%$k yourself'.

sIx


11 Jun 06 - 08:40 PM (#1757566)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: *daylia*

Ask them!


11 Jun 06 - 08:41 PM (#1757567)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Bill D

I dunno...maybe it has to do with "going on a bender"...meaning to get get very drunk..


11 Jun 06 - 08:42 PM (#1757570)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Little Hawk

They said that some at my school too. They said every rude thing you can possibly imagine. "Get bent!" was among the somewhat milder abusive expressions, but it was still quite popular.

Another one which I never figured out was: "I've got nine! Have you got nine?" If you didn't have "nine", you were a nerd. I think it had something to do with sexual potency, but I'm still not sure.

Another one, culled from English class grammar lessons was, "How's your dangling element?", to which the obligatory response was, "Mine's straight up, man!"


11 Jun 06 - 08:43 PM (#1757571)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Little Hawk

Aha! Bill D has volunteered a third possible meaning for "Get bent!". How about that? The plot thickens. I'm glad I'm not the only one who doesn't know what it means.


11 Jun 06 - 08:44 PM (#1757572)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: *daylia*

At my school we had dangling participles.


11 Jun 06 - 08:44 PM (#1757574)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Little Hawk

Jeezus! Some picture, Daylia!


11 Jun 06 - 08:44 PM (#1757575)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: number 6

where the hell did you goto to juniour high LH (Ridgmont) ??

sIx


11 Jun 06 - 08:45 PM (#1757577)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Little Hawk

In New York State. Why?


11 Jun 06 - 08:46 PM (#1757579)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: number 6

Well .. then that explains it.

sIx


11 Jun 06 - 08:49 PM (#1757582)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: bbc

Take your pick

bbc


11 Jun 06 - 08:51 PM (#1757585)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: bbc

Here's another selection for you

also bbc


11 Jun 06 - 08:53 PM (#1757586)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: John O'L

It's kinda like getting twisted, LH.

Ever get really twisted? It's like that.


11 Jun 06 - 08:55 PM (#1757588)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Peace

Another related expression: "He's all bent outta shape". Means he's pissed off about something.

"Get bent" where I'm from meant "Get Effed."


11 Jun 06 - 08:57 PM (#1757590)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Bill D

it seems it all depends on context and emphasis...and locale...


11 Jun 06 - 08:58 PM (#1757592)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: number 6

Must be ... or a diffent era.

sIx


11 Jun 06 - 09:01 PM (#1757597)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Alice

Factory area workers in my experience would say it meaning, bend over to get ------.
Well, you asked.


11 Jun 06 - 09:04 PM (#1757599)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Peace

? a sore back ?


11 Jun 06 - 09:09 PM (#1757601)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: John O'L

I thought it meant getting stoned. Never heard it used any other way.


11 Jun 06 - 09:42 PM (#1757616)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Little Hawk

Well, by golly, it seems to mean absolutely anything and everything anyone wants it to. Kind of like the word "fuck" that way.


11 Jun 06 - 09:47 PM (#1757623)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: John O'L

Well bend me dead!


11 Jun 06 - 09:50 PM (#1757624)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Bee-dubya-ell

Where I went to school it meant to get one's penis bent which, presumably, would somehow impair its functionality. Old men were thought to have erections with bends in them.


11 Jun 06 - 09:59 PM (#1757639)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: John O'L

You mean some people have straight erections?


11 Jun 06 - 10:01 PM (#1757641)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: John O'L

You mean some people have erections?


11 Jun 06 - 10:10 PM (#1757647)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Rapparee

In MY high school we would never, ever, ever use such expressions! Oh sure, we might say something like "Go stand on your head and stick your elbows up your anal orifice" or "Why don't you go engage in autoreproductive activity?" or "Mictruate on you!" or even "It behooves you to grasp your external aural appendages and exert a strong pull, and when you hear a loud popping sound your head will have broken the suction which is keeping it within your rectum."


11 Jun 06 - 10:13 PM (#1757650)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Little Hawk

Rapaire? Get bent.


11 Jun 06 - 10:43 PM (#1757676)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: frogprince

Haven't really heard anyone use "get bent" for about a hundred years now; I'm pretty sure it did just mean "get F**ked"; I'm also pretty sure that no one I ever knew could give you any logical reason why the idiom developed. You're the first person I've ever known to think about it.
Never heard anyone say "I've got nine". My intuitive guess would be that it's a grandious claim to have "nine inches", but who knows if it's really that close to logical?


11 Jun 06 - 10:56 PM (#1757682)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Little Hawk

Unfortunately, frogprince, I think about and analyze everything. Absolutely everything. That seems to be my nature, and it results in my constantly being astounded and bothered by the conventional stupidities that are taken for granted by people all around me.

Aha! Nine inches! You are most likely right about that. That's amusing, because I bet there were very few among my compatriots who had nine inches. Very few. Being rather innocent at the time, I had no idea that was what it meant.


11 Jun 06 - 11:03 PM (#1757684)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Azizi

See these entries from the HipHop Dictionary

bent
1) (v) Drunk. "It doesn't matter if I'm dead sober or I'm bent" -- Heltah Skeltah (Therapy [??]).
2) (v) Sad. "You got me bent like elbows, amongst other things" -- Outkast (Aliens [???]).
http://www.anthonyvitti.com/hiphopdictionaryb.html

****

And I very vaguely remember a R&B song "I've got nine on it" or was it "five on it" or was it ...oh never mind.


11 Jun 06 - 11:11 PM (#1757687)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Little Hawk

It's gotta be "nine inches". Gotta be. Those young idiots I was in school with year after dreadful year were obsessed with their stupid little dangly parts...most of which looked not too impressive when showering after gym class, that's for sure.

I could never fathom it. This obsession with their penis size that most guys have. Not then. Not now. A penis is like a nose or an elbow. Every guy has one (two in the case of elbows). If it works properly, then it's okay. Other than that, who really gives a damn?

I'd like to meet them all again just once so I could say, "Hey, guys? Get bent!"


11 Jun 06 - 11:12 PM (#1757688)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: GUEST

More likely from football.


11 Jun 06 - 11:15 PM (#1757691)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Little Hawk

You mean like "nine yards"? No, I don't think so. I'm almost dead positive it had to do with sex. The remark was usually accompanied by a leer, and one does not leer over football.


11 Jun 06 - 11:19 PM (#1757692)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: GUEST

You say so 'mano.


11 Jun 06 - 11:53 PM (#1757700)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: catspaw49

(As Spaw resorts to ethnic humor)

Geeziz Hawk, what the hell's the matter with you? Don't you know what's white and nine inches long?.....................Nothin'.................

Yeah, that's the "9" they were referring to but another place might have used 12. Now where I grew up the smart-ass answer was, "Yeah, right.....(holds crotch)I gotcher fuckin' 9 right here Dickless. Yeah Man, I saw your ass down at Sainato's (a pharmacy) buying pinky cheaters 'cause Trojan ain't got rubbers small enough to fit your half inch prick."

Get bent was a milder epithet that you could use without getting busted for profanity but it had the general meaning of get fucked but also and often the added meaning of bend over and take it up the kazoo or from behind, making it a truly cross gender insult. Mostly of course, no one meant any of these things and they were more often used in cappin' on each other or playing the dozens.

So does that answer all your queries you fuckin' broke-dick mamalucca?


12 Jun 06 - 12:04 AM (#1757703)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Little Hawk

You have indeed answered my questions perceptively and accurately, Spaw, homing in on all the essential points. You're right that "get bent" was a milder epithet, but with a particularly nasty added meaning, as you say.


12 Jun 06 - 01:10 AM (#1757715)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Amos

1. To get bent was an expression meaning to get screwed, perhaps imitative of the angle of insertion. Frequently used as an insult equivalent to "Screw you!".

2. It also means to get drunk or stoned, but in this sense it is not used as an insult.

3. It also means to suffer from accelerated expansion of compressed nitrogen and other gases in muscle fibers and body tissue, as a result of ascending too rapidly from a dive below a couple of atmospheres, roughly. Derived from "getting the bends" because the traditional form of the disease (decompression sickness) causes bubbles in the joints, and the afflicted diver is constantly bending his arms and legs to ease the discomfort.

A


12 Jun 06 - 03:03 AM (#1757747)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: dianavan

Never heard, 'get bent' (maybe its a guy thing) but have heard, 'she was really bent out of shape.'

I always thought it meant that she was upset or angry or was just generally over-reacting to something.


12 Jun 06 - 03:36 PM (#1758256)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Nigel Parsons

That 9 inches thing is, as I recall, a reference to Shakespeare. He decided that there were needed suitable coded references to the length of the male appendage.
These were categorised as follows:

6 inches: Much Ado About Nothing.

9 inches: As You Like It.

12 inches: A Midsummer Night's Dream!


CHEERS
Nigel


12 Jun 06 - 04:07 PM (#1758280)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: GUEST

Certainly enough to make you gag.


12 Jun 06 - 05:03 PM (#1758323)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: catspaw49

Ya' know Nigel, while that may be true, to the average American teenage male it is doubtful to mean anything because Shakespeare is a pain in the ass until he uses the word "cock" or they get to Oberon, King of the FAIRIES, married to TITiana.   We're not too far out of the trees over here...............

Spaw


12 Jun 06 - 06:18 PM (#1758386)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: McGrath of Harlow

Do Americans use "get knotted" in these situations?


12 Jun 06 - 06:21 PM (#1758390)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: catspaw49

Never heard it used where I've been Mac.

Spaw


12 Jun 06 - 06:25 PM (#1758397)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Rapparee

Nine? Like Nine Inch Nails?

We had a whole Shakespeare "quiz" we made up. I don't remember all of it, but here's some:

What's 12 inches?
As You Like It (alternately, The Taming Of the Shrew).

What's a premature ejaculation?
Love's Labors Lost.

How come your sheets are wet?
A Midsummer Night's Dream.

What would you call your Christmas date?
A Winter's Tale.

etc. It was pretty undergraduate, but then, that's what we were.


12 Jun 06 - 08:40 PM (#1758502)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T

There once was a youmg man from Kent,
Whose tool was exceedingly bent,
To save himself trouble,
He folded it double,
And instead of coming, he went.

Don T.


12 Jun 06 - 10:15 PM (#1758543)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Q (Frank Staplin)

Bent (slang) has added or changed definitions through the years. The earliest recorded printing is 1833:
Greene, "Adventures of Duckworth," II, 176. "He was seldom downright drunk, but was often .... confoundedly bent."

Bringing it more into the present, this from National Lampoon, 1975:
"Hey, everybody, let's all get bent, piss ourselves, and send our shorts to China."

A definition that has persisted is: crooked, larcenous. 1914, "His Kisser shows tha he is bent." (Jackson and Hellyer, "Vocab. 17." Extended to products- Bent booze- adulterated or secretly made.

School kids aren't very imaginative. "Get bent" essentially meant 'go to Hell.'
1969, J. Bouton, "Ball Four," p. 389: In high school [ca, 1955] ""Get bent" was used to put a guy down." Still used in an article in "Playboy, 1971: "Get bent, I said."
It was used in dialogue in "The Simpsons," 1990: "Hi, Bart! Get bent!"

These and many more in J. E. Lighter, "Dictionary of American Slang," vol. 1, pp. 136-137. Also see Oxford English Dictionary.


12 Jun 06 - 10:31 PM (#1758555)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Little Hawk

Yeah, it's just a generally negative all-purpose put down. That's how it was used in my school, but I always wondered what people meant...or thought they meant by it. This is assuming they thought at all, which may be assuming too much, of course... ;-)


12 Jun 06 - 10:43 PM (#1758562)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Little Hawk

I think it is time to pay tribute once again to one of the kids who tortured me daily in school, and liked saying "Get bent!" to people. Don Hutson!

Yes, the young fool and complete asshole, Don Hutson, from 1960's Skaneateles, New York, a kid whose ears stuck out farther than Alfred E. Neumann's and whose face was uglier than Alfred's too. Don Hutson, the jerk who talked about sex incessantly, yet never succeeded in finding a girlfriend. Don Hutson, the f*ckhead who was clearly headed for a deadend job, like retrieving carts at the local grocery or pumping gas at the local gas station or maybe washing dishes at the local truck stop. Don Hutson, the idiot who made life hell for his teachers and for any kid who was small enough to bully. Don Hutson, the complete and utter degenerate who was proud of his ability to turn any word in the English dictionary into a dirty word of some kind by altering a few letters.

Don, on the tiny, tiny chance that you or anyone you know would log onto a folk & blues website after all these years I just want to say one thing to you...

Get bent!


12 Jun 06 - 11:21 PM (#1758584)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Peace

You try being a spoon in the hands of Uri Geller. Then, you will understand the meaning.


13 Jun 06 - 01:41 AM (#1758630)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Barry Finn

"Get bent" was a common expression where I came from (Mission Hill area of Roxbury in Boston) though it was common as inner city slang for "get fucked". Thought everyone knew that.
Barry


13 Jun 06 - 03:16 AM (#1758648)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Q (Frank Staplin)

Please, Barry. In polite society (Mudcat), please use the euphemisms "Go to Hell" or "Get lost."





(he, he, he)


13 Jun 06 - 11:30 AM (#1758906)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Little Hawk

Or as the British would say..."Sod off!" or "Push off!"...both lovely expressions, I think.


13 Jun 06 - 11:42 AM (#1758917)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Peace

Nothin' beats Fuh Cough.


13 Jun 06 - 01:52 PM (#1759009)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Dave (the ancient mariner)

There was an old expression in my part of England (Lancashire) "as bent as a fiddlers bitch" Which used to refer to a small dog sometimes dancing for a busking fiddler; I guess it means the dog was given beer to drink and usually went nuts from constant performing. I think "bent in'th head" or "get bent" means crazy.

Yours, Aye. Dave


13 Jun 06 - 02:04 PM (#1759017)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: katlaughing

What a thread of elucidations!

I think have heard this expression on the BBC tv show, "Hustle" used as one of Q's postings said, i.e. crooked, illegal.

Never heard it growing up except someone getting bent out of shape...meaning pissed (US) off, upset, angry.


13 Jun 06 - 02:27 PM (#1759038)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: McGrath of Harlow

"Bent" as meaning crooked or illegal is pretty standard usage in England - applied for example to politicians, sportsmen, financiers who've been caught out engaged in cheating or stealing.

But that's a different usage from the one here, which I've never come across over here.


13 Jun 06 - 02:51 PM (#1759059)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Q (Frank Staplin)

Dave, you are correct about bent = crazy, but it is just one of the slang meanings picked up by this word.

My son (a lawyer), says some lawyers refer to crooked clients as bent. This meaning, first appearing in print in 1914, has persisted. Originally used in the U. S. by criminals (Jackson and Hellyer, 1914, "Criminal Slang"), it has extended to England (examples from the OED), used in The Times, 1958: "I had known for years that certain members of the Brighton police Force were what we call bent." The first UK appearance was in the "Sunday Pictorial," 1948.

Of products- Brophy & Partridge, in their "Songs and Slang, 1914-1918, pub. 1930- "Bent, spoiled, ruined."

Of course the term has also been applied to homosexuals.

An old term for metal work, in which the materials are bent into shape, is "bent work" (not slang), 1858.

Also a carpentry term, a section of a framework of a framed building (1815).


13 Jun 06 - 05:16 PM (#1759179)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: McGrath of Harlow

Then of course there's "bent" as meaning aptitude or skill. Not a meaning you come across all that often these days.


13 Jun 06 - 05:21 PM (#1759185)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Little Hawk

Yes. I have a bent for singing, playing guitar, and building model kits, for example. In other words, I lean strongly in favour of those activities.

"as the sapling is bent, so grows the tree"


13 Jun 06 - 07:13 PM (#1759273)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: bobad

I always thought it was akin to "getting one's nose out of joint"


13 Jun 06 - 07:15 PM (#1759278)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Peace

I'm from the sixties. One's nose should not be IN the joint.


13 Jun 06 - 07:29 PM (#1759293)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Little Hawk

Nor the other way around either. Ask Shane. He's an expert, eh?


13 Jun 06 - 08:16 PM (#1759335)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Charley Noble

I've also run across the line in some song or other that "he was either broke or badly bent."

We didn't use this expression in the small public high school that I went to in Maine. We weren't that sophisticated. We had to make do with "fuck off!"

We did have a strange word that I never did figure out what it meant: "muff it!" There were "muffers" and it generally wasn't supposed to be good if one "muffed it."

Cheerily,
Charley Noble


13 Jun 06 - 09:55 PM (#1759390)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: katlaughing

Charley, I remember hearing "muffed it," too, out here in the Rocky Mtn West, but when I grew up the only time I heard "muff" was in reference to a guy going "muff-diving," i.e. performing oral sex!


13 Jun 06 - 10:01 PM (#1759397)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Little Hawk

To "muff it up" means to screw up, to make a mistake...pure and simple. The expression has nothing to do with sex. The word "muff", however, can refer to female pubic hair when used in a certain context. This is another of the many cases of one word being used in several different ways.


13 Jun 06 - 10:04 PM (#1759400)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: frogprince

Oh, Man; for the first time in my life, I just thought of the possible implications of "Muffy" as a girl's nickname.


13 Jun 06 - 10:44 PM (#1759445)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: catspaw49

Lead kind of a sheltered life doncha' Froggy?

Spaw


13 Jun 06 - 11:01 PM (#1759453)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: frogprince

Don't worry, I know what a muff is, and I don't need diving lessons. But with all the times I've heard a girl called muffy, and all those seasons of "Muffy the Vampire Slayer, I never once stopped and asked myself how the nickname could be used so much in apparent innocence.


13 Jun 06 - 11:20 PM (#1759459)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Little Hawk

Fer Chrissake! It was "Buffy the Vampire Slayer"! The only other Buffy I ever heard of other than Buffy Sainte-Marie...one of my alltime favorite folksingers.


13 Jun 06 - 11:50 PM (#1759467)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: frogprince

Alzheimers can be fun...anyhow, I have seen Muffy as a nickname enough times, though generally in a satirical context. Never actually watched the "Buffy" show, but can't believe I "muffed" the title.


14 Jun 06 - 06:55 PM (#1760185)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Bob the Postman

I believe McGrath of Harlow was on the right track with his allusion to the phrase "get knotted". One of the meanings of the verb "to bend" is "to fasten"--for example, "The sailors bent a sail to the boom." "Sheet bend" and "carrick bend" are the names of knots. So the answer to the question "What does 'get bent' mean?" is, "It means exactly the same thing as 'get knotted'".
Next question: why "knotted"? Why not buttoned, zippered, velcroed, stapled, nailed, tied, glued, or fastened?
Perhaps someone with access to Partridge's Dictionary of Slang could look up "get bent" and "get knotted" and tell us which has the earlier citation.


14 Jun 06 - 10:28 PM (#1760337)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: *daylia*

Bent. Twisted. Toasted. Sloshed. Stoned. Plastered. Hammered. Smashed. Cooked. Fried. Wasted. Totalled.






















































Done.


14 Jun 06 - 10:38 PM (#1760348)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: catspaw49

awferchrissakes............Get Bent and got jackshit nothin' to do with Get Knotted except that both are another means of saying Get Fucked or in other words, both are slang insults. If you think there is some nautical relationship then you have a freakin' warped groove Man.

Let's all try not to make too much out of slang.......Like most of your sisters, its cheap, meaningless, and stinks in polite company.

Spaw...exiting with a classic "Dozens" line.


14 Jun 06 - 10:58 PM (#1760364)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Little Hawk

Yeah? Well, it doesn't stink half as bad as your Weimaraners do when they come back in the house after being outside on a wet day....


14 Jun 06 - 11:55 PM (#1760382)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Little Hawk

Daylia? You forgot ripped, blasted, corked, scuppered, blotto, soused, face-down-in-the-gutter, three sheets to the wind, dismasted on a lee shore, shit-faced, and blind drunk (in Blind River).


14 Jun 06 - 11:59 PM (#1760384)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Little Hawk

And...half in the bag! (that's Shane's favourite)


15 Jun 06 - 06:25 PM (#1760990)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Firecat

I always thought it meant "Go away you complete moron". Must have been wrong.


15 Jun 06 - 06:38 PM (#1760997)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Little Hawk

It can mean exactly that, Firecat. That's the great thing about such expressions...they are very flexible in both meaning and interpretation.


15 Jun 06 - 08:54 PM (#1761057)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Little Hawk

Here's a quite similar expression that is also in common usage:

"Get stuffed!"


15 Jun 06 - 09:04 PM (#1761062)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Q (Frank Staplin)

The OED finds 'get knotted in print from 1963 (meaning to to Hell [or worse]). It seems to be British otiginally, but is heard on this side of the water as well. Anecdotally, get bent was heard in the 1950's, but both are possibly older. If you want to be a word sleuth and examine every book, paper or bit of ephemera to find earlier uses, go to it.

Are the dates given in the dictionaries and slang compendia useful in determining when some phrase appeared? They are temporary points of reference, sunject to correction.

Charley, yes, your meaning of 'broke' for 'bent' is also correct and has been noted by the word sleuths.

Catspaw, Sie haben Recht.


16 Jun 06 - 01:15 PM (#1761568)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Charley Noble

I wonder if the Australian slang "crook" is related to this discussion?

There's the old bush song "Wallaby Stew" which has the chorus:

So stir the wallaby stew, make soup with the kangaroo's tail,
I'll tell you things is pretty crook since Dad got put in gaol.

Cheerily,
Charley Noble


17 Jun 06 - 10:20 AM (#1762177)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Charley Noble

Hah! I figured I'd stump everyone with "crook."

Where's Bob Bolton when we needs him?

Cheerily,
Charley Noble


17 Jun 06 - 10:31 AM (#1762183)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: frogprince

Charley, you just can't expect anyone else to even hope to try to find logic in Aussie slang! : )


17 Jun 06 - 11:05 AM (#1762203)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: JennyO

..unless they happen to be an Aussie, frogprince :-)

As for the word "crook", I don't think it relates to this discussion. When a thing or a situation is crook, it means it's not going well, or it's not working properly, or it's broken. If you're feeling crook, you're feeling sick. And if you are a crook, you're a criminal.

If we want to tell someone where to go, we might say get f**ked, get knotted, get stuffed, get nicked, or just f**k off, piss off, POQ or even take a long walk off a short pier.

There's a good site of colourful Aussie expressions here:

SPEAK AUSTRALIAN


17 Jun 06 - 11:01 PM (#1762582)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Charley Noble

Thanks, gentle JennyO, for the clarification,

We just got back from a bender but that's probably different from getting crooked.

Cheerily,
Charley Noble


18 Jun 06 - 07:58 AM (#1762705)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: JennyO

So you hit the turps and tied one on, didja Charlie? Downed a few stubbies of the amber fluid and now you're full as a goog?

So tomorrow if you're feeling a bit crook, ya better have some hair of the dog and chuck a sickie - just tell your boss you're in bed with the wog. And anyone who doesn't believe that can just bugger off :-)


18 Jun 06 - 10:33 AM (#1762781)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Charley Noble

;~)
Charley Noble


19 Jun 06 - 01:50 AM (#1763383)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Little Hawk

Har! Har! I love it, Jenny! By Gawd, I can almost believe I'm in Oz when I read that stuff. Crocodile Dundee lives again.


19 Jun 06 - 08:22 PM (#1764146)
Subject: RE: BS: What does 'get bent' mean...or imply?
From: Q (Frank Staplin)

More digression- Crook (Oz) first appeared in print in the Sidney Bulletin, 1898, acc. to the OED. It was spelled krook. By WW1, it was spelled with a 'c'.