Maybe it's too much sun. Racing--for on the bumpy, pothole-filled roads of St Croix 50 mph is racing--from one errand to the next while trying to beat my contractor to my house, a strange thought entered my mind. Do other cultures refuse to touch things with a 10 foot pole?
The phrase is commonplace in my native south Georgia and can refer to either a person or a situation or any animal, vegetable, mineral now that I come to thing of it. e.g. "that dog has mange, I wouldn't touch him with a ten foot pole" (animal) or "those collards set out in the boiler overnight, I wouldn't touch them with a ten foot pole" (vegetable) or "Marsha can keep that big diamond ring because she had to sleep with Ted Thomas to get it and I wouldn't touch either one of them with a ten foot pole (person, situation, mineral). Marsha and Ted are fictional, as far as I know.
I just began to wonder today. . .do people in the UK use this phrase and if so does it have a metric equivalent?
The short answer I found, 'cause I know y'all are just dying to know, is no because the Brits invented the original 10 foot pole. Apparently river barges were steered with 10 foot poles and the slang phrase is first documented in print in 1758, Dictionary of Cliches.
When I googled "10 foot pole" I found: a band, sexual innuendo, fantasy football and someone who thought it was a racist slang directed at people of Polish descent (?).
I know what you're thinking--I have too much time on my hands. No, actually, I don't. I'm waiting for an editor and an interview subject to get back to me. I have two gentlemen grinding countertops right outside my window. I have b&b guests whose flight was delayed in Charlotte, NC. I'm fearful my plumber's not coming today which leaves me with a nonfunctioning kitchen sink and (totally unrelated) clogged master bath shower drain. I'm not going to make it today to the tailor and the two stores where I need to exchange merchandise. I have to make the third trip to the dump today (only so much trash fits in a Jeep wrangler), pick up my husband from work and walk the dog.
The 10 foot pole thing just invaded my brain and sometimes, no matter how busy you are, you just have to get it out of your system.
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