Nip it in the … what?!!

Silence Dogood here. Maybe it’s just me and our friend Ben, but when we see a grammatical or language blooper that qualifies for Richard Lederer’s designation of “anguished English,” it cheers us up no end. Some of the best ones stay with us for years.

I was reminded of this just now when I got an e-mail from DogAge on how to train your dog not to jump up on you (and others). The e-mail noted, correctly, that rather than encouraging this behavior, you should nip it in the bud.

If you’ve ever had a dandelion in your lawn, you know what this folk expression means. If you don’t cut off a dandelion flower before it goes to seed, you’ll soon have bazillion dandelions growing in your lawn. You need to nip that dandelion flower in the bud, i.e., to catch it early, before it really turns into a problem. 

However, reading this DogAge tip reminded me of a classic misunderstanding of the expression, where someone wrote that you should combat a bad habit by “nipping it in the butt.” Though I’m not sure how nipping something in the butt would cause it to cease and desist from bad behavior—in fact, I’d think it would provoke the outraged party to even worse behavior—I’ll admit that I love the thought of this. And it just seems so appropriate in the case of dog misbehavior. “If you don’t start early to train your dog not to jump up, he’ll nip you in the butt!” You can bet on it.

          ‘Til next time,

                     Silence