proper response

[macwilkin]

Interesting about OK & Och Aye -- other accounts list the origin being the political campaign of Martin Van Buren, the Democratic Vice-President of Andrew Jackson. Van Buren, originally from Kinderhook, New York, was called "Old Kinderhook", or "OK", which was used in his Presidential reelection campaign in 1840 -- Van Buren lost, but OK stuck around. That's a new one to add to my "Scots influences on America" talk -- thanks, Daz! :mrgreen:

"Huzzah!" -- Here is a nice & consice article:

http://www.randomhouse.com/wotd/inde...?date=20001108

Yours Aye,

Todd

[Archangel]

think of "hoot, mon" as Gaelic for "oy vey", it's more a stereotype expression used the same way. My mother uses it as a late warning like, you've already burned your hand on a hot pot then she says it. The same context that I've heard others use the Jewish phrase.

ignore it, and privately take it as confirmation that somebody sees you as something vaguely Scottish.

Last year I had somebody walk past me and swear in Gaelic, I don't think it really was at me, it was sort of sharing it with me in a weird way. I didn't really know the appropriate response, I don't usually swear in English and that was the only swearing in Gaelic I really know and he'd used it first. (So I flashed him: I'm kidding, I'm kidding, I didn't.)

[Severian]

"'Hoots, mon!' is an all-purpose mild exclamation: 'Hoots' originally
functioning as a form of pejorative, like 'Nonsense!' or 'Rubbish!'

'Mon!' simply means man.

So originally, the exclamation would have served to point out to the
addressee that he (I've never heard of 'Hoots, womon!') was talking rubbish (or muck).

HOWEVER - the expression has become fully Lauderised, usually employed as a form of greeting: ('Hoots mon! Och Aye the Noo! It's a braw bright moonlicht nicht tae go roamin in the gloamin!') and as such has attained the status of such sub-DC Thomson utterances as 'Jings!' 'Crivvens!' or 'Help ma Boab!'

All of which are used to stereotype Scottish Vernacular and none of which
would ever be used by any self-respecting Scot this side of a Sunday Post. "