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CANADIAN HIGH SCHOOL YEARBOOK PHRASES 1. May all your blues be Labatt’s. “That one I remember from signing high school graduation books,” emails Lance Haines of Nanaimo, British Columbia. Labatt’s Blue is a popular Canadian beer.
THE FROGBAHN A somewhat racist neology of Ontario is The Frogbahn, coined as a pun on the German word for ‘major highway,’ die Autobahn. The Frogbahn is Highway 69 heading into northern Ontario, from Parry Sound to Sudbury,where many French-speaking Ontarians live.
COLD WEATHER SAYING 1. It was so cold this morning when I let the bull out into the barnyard, why that old bull, he had to run back into the barn and slip into a warm jersey. from Bill Turner in Brandon , Manitoba
2. Cool as the drool on a polar bear’s dick from Len Ross in North Bay , Ontario
CANADIAN FRIENDLINESS Canadians are so friendly they’ll loan you their arses and never sit down again. Len Ross, North Bay , Ontario
BOOZE TERM - BAT JUICE
Bill Turner continues: “On a Caribbean cruise once about 9 years ago I visited the Bacardi shrine in San Juan, Puerto Rico. I wasthrilled to be where the miracle juice is produced until I began talking with an old American Merchant Mariner and asked him if the daily “tot of rum” was prevalent in the American Merchant fleet. He said, “Hell yes and that’s why I can’t stand the stuff now!” He went on to explain that the daily tot was cheap rum, a by-product of the sugar industry and that rather than throw it out as waste, they bottle it and sell it to people like me!” Bill Turner was probably told an apocryphal anecdote if ever there was one. Does it seem logical that a commercial liquor company would sell the United States Merchant Marine inferior booze? I don’t think so.
THE VANITY OF HUMAN WISHES Shit in one hand and wish in the other and see which one fills the fastest. • This is said to quell outlandish wishes stated aloud.
CANADIAN SAYINGS FROM HOCKEY
Keep yer stick on the ice! • This injunction to stay in the game is a metaphorical imperative drawn from the sport of hockey. It also means, “Calm down.”
Skate with it! • Another life lesson from hockey, this one means to say, “Learn to accept the hand that fate deals you; stay in the game of life. Grow up, dude.”
Ain’t that a puck in the head? • This reference to a hockey accident is applied to anything unwanted, a misfortune or unpleasant happenstance.
He had a forehead pock-marked with puck dents. • This suggests the stereotypical “stunned” look of the hockey goon, much like Comedian Dave Broadfoot’s great creation, hockey player Bobby Clobber.
COOL SLANG No big whoop or big fuckin’ whoop • This is used by persons who wish to appear totally cool at all times, said in the face of any enthusiasm shown by another person. The classic male dick-wagger-bully-show-off employs such phrases to demean and to diminish any accomplishment by another male. Duplicating how the bully was treated by his bully father, such putdowns are what the bully likes to pass on, in the hope that someone else, somewhere, somehow, might be made as pathetically unhappy as the bully. The best defense from this verbal bullying is to ignore it, leaving the sour-souled bully to roil and stew in the foul juices of odium that haunt and besmirch his childhood memories. Do you have Canadian sayings you’d like to share, at the same time obtaining the everlasting renown of being mentioned as a contributor to this column, a word site that receives more than 1 million hits per year? Email them to me. Use the link below. If you want to share some wonderful Canadian sayings, both in English and in Québec French, you will find more than 3,000 Canadian expressions in my three sayings books. Each of my three volumes of Canadian Sayings contains about 1,200 zesty phrases used by Canadians both today and throughout our history. Each volume has completely different sayings that do not appear in the other volumes. Remember that profits from the sale of my books keep this website online. When sales of Canadian Sayings books dry up, this site disappears forever. Enemies and friends, take notice. If you want to do me a favour, insist that the bookstore order a few shelf copies of my Canadian Sayings books. For a preview, click on the graphic below.
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© 2009 William Gordon Casselman
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order online from Chapters/Indigo $10.95 in all Canadian bookstores Says one reader on the Chapters website: “If you're Canadian you gotta read this book. This book made me laugh till I cried. Things I thought only I heard during my youth were there in print before my eyes! I love this book. Everyone I show it to has the same reaction. Different sayings tickled my funny bone on different days - so they never get boring. Keep up this wonderful treasure-trove of Canadiana, Bill.” — Angie Plamondon published by McArthur & Company, Toronto, Canada
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Bat juice: Correspondent Bill Turner writes: “This may be a Manitoba term for Bacardi rum, since the symbol that Bacardi chose to picture on every bottle is a bat.” 
