I was talking to Steve West and Chris on the radio today, and used an expression that I thought everyone knew — I referred to a color as "skyblue pink." They looked at me mystified, and I was mystified too until I realized that they had no idea what "skyblue pink" was. So I had to explain that it's a fanciful color that you use when no other color will do — along the lines of "you could make it skyblue pink, and I still wouldn't wear it."

Later on, it occurred to me that there are probably a lot of expressions like that, that come from who knows where and are particular to a small number of people emanating from a particular region or area of endeavor.

For my part, I take after my mother's side of the family when it comes to colorful sayings. I collect them. Some expressions handed down in the family include "going to hell in a handbasket" (which I hear from time to time) and "hotter than the hinges of Hades" (which I never hear). My grandmother used to call people "koo-koo" and say "forward, ho ho!" whenever she wanted us to go somewhere more quickly.

My father was good with the oddball expressions too. One of his was "Gracious mustard plasters" which I think he got from an old radio show. He was also big with the bebop talk, so we heard a lot of "don't flip your wig" and "stop flapping your beak" as well as a host of others that he might have made up.

Among my own slang phrases are a few that I confess I got out of a book — specifically, a hipsters guide to slang for the modern world, circa 1980. Among these are "three hour tour" (to designate something that should be quick and easy, but surprisingly isn't) and "on to Upalscrabblenyenk" (let's go!).

On the off-color side of things, I've taken to substituting "Blast!" for more powerful swears, and my favorite new pejorative is "nincompoop," which can be generalized if necessary to "nincompoopery." I also like "dickfor" for a variety of reasons, which I'll leave to the reader to discern.

Fact is, there are a lot of ways to express yourself in America, and when you add them all together, it's makes you glad you already speak American and don't have to learn it from scratch...

That said, anyone else have any colorful sayings — handed down or otherwise — that aren't commonly heard and can be quoted on a family web site? If so, I'm sure we'd all love to hear them. I might even add a few to my collection....