Originally Posted by geodeticman.5
Hey BILLW - I was working on my "stemming" post I guess at the same time you were... then a phone call came in....just now hitting return.
I did not mean to "steal your thunder".
Paddle to the Sea - I may have been hearing Patriot's Dream wrong all along, but is the term uptight - for drunk - you cited - what I've been hearing as "tight' as in "and the bugler ..got tight...." ?
Also, the "Hexic Ring" - I am intrigued, as I can only think of p.p. "gonna grab my coat, my toothbrush, and my....hexagram..." somethin like that in i think "Gotta Get Away".
I am not into proving people wrong - far from it.. I am wondering if I have been hearing them wrong myself, or maybe they are different songs/words..... for the sake of conversation, I am not even looking em up. I 'spect you are right.
Shut-up-and-Deal - do you remember the big honker thread about two years back on NAVVY? lol - there were probably ten different "definitions" found - but I gotta tell you, yours makes the most context-correct sense of all I have heard.
I found definitions for labourers (which I think you are right on Shut-up-and-deal, and sea-faring usage, and surveying - all three.
See, I thought, without looking it up, that in my field (groan) navvy was shop-slang for Navigator - one old term for the Surveyor who guided the train -track laying precisely with topographic leveling measurement so grades did not exceed - I believe 1.5% max.... which is only 0.68 degrees grade.....
They also kep 'em on-line direction-wise, and calculated the curves and staked-em out - they were ALWAYS spirals, to ease the train into, and out of the curve...infact one railroad curve, still used to this day, is a field aproximation so they did not have to use calculus back then... called the "Searle's Railroad Ten-Chord curve" - which allowed staking out to within a few hundredths of a foot by using a chart of ...uh... chords...straight lines... to ten points along the curve........and a device called a "Beaman Arc" - POINT BEING - so the Surveyor - historically misnamed the "Railroad Engineers". but called NAVVY'S at times...!! - that guided building and route, were called that because surveying....was the original form of... oh boy (covering head)...engineering.... all the way back to Egyptian times , and Socrates.
And in this century, surveyors who would "navigate" for a project, were sometimes called Navvies - I thin there are several context=specific definitions, ... but your definition, imho - makes the most sense - we are the "Navvies. who -work- upon the railroad, swingin our hammers to the .....' yep - I'm with ya.
WAIT A MINUTE - in addition to the well-looked up definition of Navvy, I just found all three references above, and the shop slang version I knew of in my field with the following INFO.COM SEARCH ENGINE, TRY THIS verbatim string in the multi-search-engine combinatorial info.com:
at info.com prompt:
Navvy Navie Navvie Surveying
- and you'll get a mixed bag - THIS IS THE HOLY GRAIL OF "NAVVY" REFERENCES - WITH - LABOURERS, SEAFARING USAGE, AND SURVEYING.....CHECK IT OUT...i could hyperlink it out the ying yang for you, but you can attach to it if you want to REALLY see some interesting usages of term Navvy. But, some definite surveying -context returns I'll not bore you further with eloboration. There is a whole book on Navvy's. !!
MY TERMS I LEARNED LISTENING TO GL -
Don Quixote - "stemming" - of which there is another well-known BIG thread....... SORRY BILLW - post script upon posting I saw you had added a post as well on this term....
stemming gold - came down to two very likely candidates 1. gold-smelters in blast furnaces meting the gold.... would like their smoking pipes stems with gold litttle by little to slip it out of the factory as I recall.... but that does not jove se well with stemming gold in a bar.. which led to the other likely definition found....
stemming gold - in old bars in mining acmps and such, the floor-boards were set a crack apart - as in patio deskc and fences know - so wood could swell without bowing...and drinkers, getting gold coins out... would drop them frequently while imbibing.. on the floor, where they would fall through the cracks.... to the ground beneath the floor.. where poor men would ostensibly crawl and gather them up.... stemming gold.....it does not lead to the sound of the word, but the context in the song is good....
I thin one of the metal shop craftsman in the forum knew of the pipe stemming - WES - was that you ? or IRON ? - we have some tool-and-die metal-crafters, and pne gentleman who visited a gold factory, where they explained the pipe-stem smuggling, as I recall.... that one "sounds" likely.... but not in the song context.... the floorbaords one bags it for me on the context..... fascinating
Thinking of the vocabulary learned from Lightfoot songs, one subject comes to mind.
You know, Gord seems to be a VERY well-read man.... his vocabulary is extensive, and also historically noteworthy - historical terms, that is... and sea-faring....which he seems to enjoy somewhat defining his oft-sung sea chanties and sailing terms, as in his opening song in many concerts, more historically - If It Should Please You......(paraphrasing) "sing some nautical songs... anf songs of the old HIGHWAYYY....nuh nuhnuhnanuhhnuhI think I'm here to stay......put away those blues.... settle on back now.. I'll do my best for you...." and so forth -
he is often cited as singing many a sea-chanty, or referring to it himself, but as an exlusive defining term, but one of the strong influences in his music - just listen to "DayLight Katy" paraphrasing again "she walks by the sea where the sea runs wild, where the waves run steep and tall, etc..." = even in songs not about sea-faring.... he seems to genuinely love the ocean - and the great lakes
Like the IMAX FILM 'Mysteries of the Great Lakes" - there is a great trailer-teaser for that, with a rarely allowed usage of TWOTEF as a soundtrack song for the film, you can hear in the video clip, that starts with strange cliff-drawings and etc... with haunting use of Gord's TWOTEFat just the right time - this is in the Valerie McGee maintained "multi-hued, almost metallic halo blue-coloured" GL site I used to think of, perhaps incorrectly, as what once was MATHEW PHIFER's GL site - while he was going to NorthWestern U., as I recall... I don't see his name anymore in it.... Val am I correct ?
~geo steve
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