Stormont spat sparks conversation about strange sayings

When Edwin Poots recently warned Jim Alister that he would ‘clean his clock’, some people were shocked, while others simply sat back and scratched their head.

The radiators had hardly been switched on in Stormont last week, but the chamber was already starting to heat up.

With so many feuds festering over the past two years, it was tough to know from where the first fight would erupt.

However, given Jim Alister’s vehement view that the DUP’s decision to go back into government has been nothing short of a Judas-like betrayal of the union, perhaps we should not have been surprised when he and Edwin Poots started exchanging barbs.

But things took an unexpected turn when Big Ed told Wee Jim that he would ‘clean his clock’, creating a wave of public conversation around what that phrase actually means, and whether or not the British Boxing Board of Control would sanction a scrap between the two titans of unionist politics.

Obviously, Big Ed would have size and youth on his side, but one should never underestimate the power of pure, unbridled wickedness.

Anyway, depending on what house you grew up in, to ‘clean somebody’s clock’ can hold very different meanings.

Some people, including Jim, claimed it was a euphemistic colloquialism for ‘punch in the face’, and that the Stormont Speaker was bang out of order.

Others, however, rushed to Big Ed’s defence, insisting it meant only to ‘put somebody in their box’.

However, for most people in Tyrone, who by and large were totally unfamiliar with the expression, all we could do was interpret the words literally and reason that Big Ed, in a bold and bizarre gesture of goodwill, had attempted to bring an abrupt end to the quarrel by offering to buff Jim’s Fitbit, or possibly shine the face of some precious Alister heirloom.

Anyway, though we may never know what Mr Poots really meant, here are some other odd and uncommon phrases that have puzzled some readers of the TyroneHerald since their childhood…

Saying: “You should have burled your hoop when you were fit to run after it.”

Translation: “You ought to have taken your chance when youth was in your favour.”

Saying: “What should you expect from a pig but a grunt?”

Translation: “One should anticipate bad manners when dealing with a person of low or contemptible character.”

Saying: “He’s a head that would make an onion cry.”

Translation: “His cranium and face are so unattractive and/or frightening that it could cause one to weep.”

Saying: “You’re useful where there is no cat.”

Translation: “A person’s appetite is so great so as to ensure no food is ever left over.”

Saying: “They tripped over a straw and the hen kicked them.”

Translation: “A person tripped and fell without any apparent explanation.”