Spectacles, Testicles...

[poliphilo]

"Spectacles, testicles, watch and wallet."

Ailz comes across this mantra in a novel she's reading where the narrator speaks of it having "religious connotations".

"Religious connotations?" She turns to me.

I know the phrase as the refrain of a poem by some author who's name I forget. I'd thought he'd originated it. Apparently not; it seems to be something they say in Yorkshire.

But religious connotations?

An idea begins to dawn- and I stand up to try it out- with sweeping hand movements, pointing to the items in turn.

Spectacles, testicles, watch and wallet.

It's a mnemonic for making the sign of the cross.

Go on, try it yourself....

Comments

[d-floorlandmine.livejournal.com]

I think, when originally coined, it referred to pocket watches, rather than wrist.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

If it's been round a while that would have to be the case.
When did wrist watches come in? Early 20th century?

[d-floorlandmine.livejournal.com]

Yep. I think they started to become used by the military in the late 19th, and then took off following WWI.

[shewhomust.livejournal.com]

That makes sense. I'd been thinking something similar about the wallet - that I'd been thinking of it as being in the breast pocket.