Origins

The Wooing of Miss Hoopty

by Dalya Goldberger

Friday night at their favourite local Irish pub.

Delilah enters the crowded bar in search of Miss Hoopty. Amid the sea of raised beer glasses and after-work crowd, she spots Miss Hoopty’s long, curly auburn tresses and slowly makes her way over to her.

"In our usual spot I see," said Delilah, coming up from behind.

"Don’t do that! You know I hate it when you see me first. Why do you think I insist on meeting you outside!" scolded the startled Miss Hoopty.

"Sorry, sorry," Delilah apologized, having momentarily forgotten this, one of Miss Hoopty’s more common idiosyncrasies. She signalled the bartender for her usual half pint of Honey Brown.

"Anyway, you’re just in time," forgave Miss Hoopty, "that cougar over there has already waved at me twice. I think she’s trying to recruit me."

Delilah looked over to see a woman in her fifties with big hair sitting at the bar with a glass of white wine in hand, the shape of her lips imprinted on the glass in hot pink lipstick. True to form, she wore gold hot pants and a tight animal print shirt. Long red fingernails extended from two bejewelled fingers that gripped a filtered cigarette. She was talking to two young men.

Delilah laughed. "Well, she probably knows a cougar-in-the-making when she sees one. You’re all ‘bling-blinged’ up."

Miss Hoopty glared at Delilah, then surveyed the room.

"Seems to be the usual wasteland," sniffed Miss Hoopty. "Soon this place will turn into a spitter bar."

Miss Hoopty’s head jerked to the side — she suddenly found herself being yanked away by her hair, which was caught in someone’s shirt button.

"I’m stuck! I’m stuck!" she wailed through her laughter.

Looking horrified, the man stopped and untangled her hair from his button.

"I’m so sorry. Are you okay? I’m Warren, by the way."

Still convulsing with laughter, Miss Hoopty nodded that she was. It was a few minutes before the two women could stop laughing long enough to converse with the poor fellow, but by then he had already apologized again and taken his leave.

"Nice move, Jezebel. That’s one way to meet a guy," congratulated Delilah, finally getting a hold of herself. "Why did you let him get away? He’s got the Molson muscle you like in a man."

Miss Hoopty crinkled her nose in disapproval.

"What? Suddenly you’re all hoity-toity in your tastes. What happened?" asked Delilah, laughing.

Before she could answer, another young man, clutching a half-empty glass of beer in his hand like a safety blanket, approached the two women.

"Excuse me, but I couldn’t help notice what just happened. Are you okay?" he asked Miss Hoopty.

"Yes, I’m fine," she replied, wiping the tears from her eyes.

In accordance with bar etiquette, names were exchanged and the conversation quickly turned to what one does for a living.

"I’m the news assignment editor for a local TV station — you know, the one where the reporters carry their own cameras," he informed us.

"Uh oh," said Delilah under her breath. She made a sideways glance at Miss Hoopty.

"So, you’re a gatekeeper," said Miss Hoopty calmly, as she put her drink down, wrung her hands, and took a deep breath in preparation for her signature rant about the evils of the media.

"Run away!" cried Delilah, shoving the unsuspecting suitor backwards before Miss Hoopty could launch into her tirade.

Looking confused, the man returned to his friends.

"Miss D, why don’t you let me educate him?" demanded Miss Hoopty, who looked like her only fun for the evening had been cut short. She let out a big sigh.

"I’m bored. Let’s go get some smoked meat poutine."

Delilah nodded in agreement. "Okay, twist my rubber arm."

Delilah, from the name of the biblical courtesan, signifies both a temptress and a seductive wife or mistress who turns to treachery. In the biblical story, Delilah is bribed by the Philistines to discover the source of Samson’s strength. After three unsuccessful attempts, she learns on the fourth attempt that his strength lies in his long hair. As Samson slept through the night, Delilah cut off his hair, thereby betraying him to his enemies. Miss Hoopty thinks this is a most fitting nickname for her friend.

Cougar, a term believed to be coined in a television episode of "Sex in the City." A cougar is a woman, usually in her late forties, fifties or sixties who wears a lot of makeup, flashy jewellry, and tight-fitting animal print clothing. She frequents bars in order to seduce younger men.

Bling-bling is an American street slang term for jewellry. The terms derives from the sound jewellry makes when it clinks together. Delilah and Miss Hoopty use it sarcastically to poke fun at middle-class Canadian spitters who try to look and sound like the teens they see in American rap videos.

Spitter, a disapproving term coined by Miss Hoopty to refer to adolescent boys (and sometimes girls) between the ages of 12 and 17, who dress in baggy pants, smoke and spit on the ground every two minutes.

Jezebel is a biblical term still used figuratively today for "women who flaunt loose morals" or a "boldface prostitute."

Molson muscle, a Canadian term derived from the Canadian beer brand Molson Canadian. Molson muscle is used to denote a pot belly, presumably developed as a result of drinking too much beer.

Hoity-toity, is believed to be an anglicized variation of the French haut toit or "high roof." A few centuries ago, a pretentious upper-class Frenchman often took the opportunity to look down from his haut toit on the lower classes. Through mispronunciation, it became hoity-toity. The Oxford English Dictionary however, claims that it is a rhyming compound based on hoit, to "romp," which is now obsolete. By this theory, hoity-toity was first recorded in 1668 to mean giddy behaviour and then came to mean haughty in 1830, possibly because the same socialites who were "giddy" were also haughty.

Gatekeeper, a person who controls access to, or availability of, information. The term is often used in Canadian schools of mass communication and journalism to describe the person who decides what to publish and what not to publish.

Smoked meat poutine, a more fattening and higher cholesterol version of the French-Canadian delicacy poutine, which consists of french fries smothered in gravy and cheese curds. This version includes chopped smoked meat and was made popular by Dunns, a Montreal-based delicatessen chain.

Twist my rubber arm, is a variation on twist a person’s arm, which means to apply coercion to overcome a person’s reluctance to do something. Twisting a rubber arm implies that you do not need to apply much coercion to get somebody to do something.

Dalya Goldberger is Managing Editor of Writer’s Block.

Sources: Encyclopedia of Word and Phrase Origins, 1997 by Robert Hendrikson http://www.girlsite.org/Html/creative/pow/slang/pow_slang.htm [link no longer functions]
The Canadian Oxford Dictionary, 1998