Do me a favor. Put your lip over your head... and swallow.

Although he’s not really all that old, half the time myhubby acts like a grumpy old man . . . an old fogey, as it were.  The scary thing is, if he’s like this nowwhat am I in for when he really is old?? Holy crow!

So, what in the heck is an old fogey anyway?  A fogey is an old man with who is extremelyfussy with an overly conservative attitude. Therefore, adding old to fogey is redundant since the word already assumesold age.  It’s akin to an ATM and ATM machine,if you catch my drift.

Okay . . . where does catch mydrift come from?  Drift, when used inthis manner, means to drive . . . so you could just as easily say “if you catchwhat I’m driving at”. 

Now that that’scleared up . . . where does the word fogey (or fogy) originate?

It’s possible that ‘fogy’ is derived from the English word ‘fogram/fogrum’which is a person with old-fashioned oroverly conservative attitudes.  When usingthis word it is most often preceded with ‘old’. 

However, I’m leaning towards theword ‘fogy’ that dates back to the 18^th century.  It’s an out of use Scots word that means eitherbloated or moss-covered . . . so it would kind of be like a distended, moldyold man.  That doesn’t exactly describemy hubby but it’s certainly something to look forward to! 

Interestingly and perhaps corroborating this association isthat, in the same era, military veterans were often referred to as ‘foggies’ indirect correlation to the Scots use of the word . . . as in crusty old soldiersbeing moss covered with age.   Later ‘oldfogy’ became a term used when referring to old or decrepit soldiers.   Evenso far as longevity pay based on length of service being referred to as ‘fogypay’.

I wonder if wives can claim ‘fogy pay’ based on however longthey are married and how grumpy their husband is   . . . hmmmm.  

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