Horizon

Never heard it before.

Yes, probably military. To 'fall out' of a march means to have collapsed due to injury or fatigue, etc.

Thanks. Hm.

At least one of the two people I've heard using the term that way has no military associations that I know of, and she's a lifelong resident of San Francisco, which is not especially a military town.

I don't know if it matters that both people I've heard it from are African American women.

The military people I've known were more likely to use jargon like "grabasstic" than that strange use of "fall out."

San Francisco, which is not especially a military town.

Not any more perhaps, but a mere 15 years ago? The Presidio, Alameda Point, Mare Island, Moffett Field ...

Anyway, perhaps your acquaintances were just avid readers of mid-period Kipling (did you ask?).

I'm an avid reader of early Orwell but I don't go around calling people BFs, now, do I?

Quite right about San Francisco's military past. In Joel's childhood memory, Fleet Week was a major festivity cheerfully celebrated by all or anyway most. We still get the Blue Angels about once a year.

I'm an avid reader of early Orwell but I don't go around calling people BFs, now, do I?

I have no idea. Though the next time you have an altercation with one of San Francisco's finest you could always suggest to him that his pater was a navvy.

How many "military" terms have joined the common language with so few of us ever having much interaction with the armed forces? Hitting the head, booking, and the legendary snafu. Must be dozens more.

One of the things that always struck me about reading nautical fiction like the O'Brian or Hornblower series was the massive number of common idioms that come from naval jargon.

Murphy's Law was invented by a perfectionist aircraft mechanic in WWII, wasn't it?

Words and phrases derived from popular use in the First World War include: blimp, cold feet, crummy, cushy, dud, funk, jumping off point, lousy, over the top, rookie and time-serving.

Of the WWII neologisms, Orwell especially enjoyed the verb, "to winkle out." (see "The English People"). BTW could someone explain the original military meaning of "winkle"?

And, Alan, are you sure about "jumping off point" being of WWI origin? I had a dim idea that a "jumping-off place" in the old West was the last town from which one set out into the wilderness. On the other hand, the only time I've personally heard the term used in the inland West, it was in a way that suggested an origin in parachute jumping: an elderly Indian in Susanville, California, which is already remote, told me, "Alturas is the jumping-off place of the world." In other words, he explained, if you wanted to jump off the edge of the earth, the place to go would be Alturas, county seat of the sparsely populated northeasternmost county in California.

"To extract or eject (as a winkle from its shell with a pin)" (c/o OED). One winkled out entrenched enemy positions by tools of appropriate persuasion - hand-grenades, etc.

See
http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/000917.html

The use of "fall out" to mean lose one's balance or faint seems to be common in the American South.

Thanks for stopping by, Mark. Love your blog.