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A Thick Ear
Number Six Started conversation Oct 12, 2006
Why don't people threaten each other with Thick Ears any more? I just heard the phrase on 6Music a minute a go, and have been giggling ever since. Joe Mace is making it very difficult for me to go to bed right now, because he keeps playing very good music and I have to keep waiting to find out what it is...
A Thick Ear
Number Six Posted Oct 12, 2006
Mind you, if he keeps it up, I shall have to pop down to London and give him a thick ear. I need to get some sleep. I'm a bit under the weather with a snuffly sore throat...
A Thick Ear
There is only one thing worse than being Gosho, and that is not being Gosho Posted Oct 12, 2006
Why don't people threaten other people with a thick ear any more...
Political correctness, and personal injury lawyers.
A Thick Ear
I'm not really here Posted Oct 13, 2006
hmm, I often threaten children with that. 
I've also been known to threaten to box their ears as well.
A Thick Ear
broelan Posted Oct 13, 2006
Is this anything similar to threatening someone with a fat lip?
A Thick Ear
Number Six Posted Oct 13, 2006
Maybe a thick ear is what you get if someone's trying to give you a fat lip and you move your head out of the way but not quite far enough...
We were discussing this at work today, and concluded there was a sliding scale from a clip round the ear, to a thick ear, to boxing someone's ears.
I must still admit that I wouldn't know a thick ear if I saw one. Are they like cauliflower ears? Where's Gosho when you need him - I'm sure this sort of thing's up his street...
Suddenly I'm remembering an episode of Hancock's Half Hour - "The Crown vs James, S." - where Hancock's an incompetent barrister and has to successfully prosecute Sid in an open and shut case or hang up his wig.
It doesn't look good for Sid, and then the case is adjourned overnight, and the following day they discover that all 100-and-something witnesses to the crime were admitted to hospital that morning with broken noses and cauliflower ears. 
A Thick Ear
Number Six Posted Oct 29, 2006
A bunch of fives! Also, brandishing your fist and saying "Why I oughta..."
A Thick Ear
There is only one thing worse than being Gosho, and that is not being Gosho Posted Oct 29, 2006
"Where's Gosho when you need him - I'm sure this sort of thing's up his street..."
What are you implying by that? Why I oughta... 
If I remember rightly, Mick McManus was prone to cauliflower ears and his opponents would go for them as soon as they started to swell up. Or even before.
My Dad used all three of those phrases when I was a kid (cauliflower ear, thick ear, box your ears), but my favourite is undoubtedly 'a punch up the bracket' Not sure where that originated. It's sounds Goon-ish and I've heard them use it many times, but I don't know for sure if they invented it. I recall it being very popular in the 60s.
By the way, here are the five suggestions that the new-fangled Firefox spellchecker (and 'spellchecker' is not in the spellcheck dictionary 
) suggested for 'McManus':
Manuel's
McMahon's
Manuel
McMahon
tetanus
Tetanus? 
A Thick Ear
rev. paperboy (god is an iron) Posted Dec 13, 2006
what about serving the traditional fare of "knuckle sandwich"?
A Thick Ear
Crazyace Posted Dec 13, 2006
Nobody threatens with a thick ear these days because society has become so violent that nobody threatens at all. They just assault !!!
A Thick Ear
Number Six Posted Jun 2, 2009
I'm sure a punch up the bracket was one of Tony Hancock's catchphrases...
A Thick Ear
There is only one thing worse than being Gosho, and that is not being Gosho Posted Jun 2, 2009
And the Goons... and probably Steptoe too
Key: Complain about this post
A Thick Ear
- 1: Number Six (Oct 12, 2006)
- 2: Number Six (Oct 12, 2006)
- 3: Ferrettbadger. The Renegade Master (Oct 12, 2006)
- 4: There is only one thing worse than being Gosho, and that is not being Gosho (Oct 12, 2006)
- 5: I'm not really here (Oct 13, 2006)
- 6: AlexAshman (Oct 13, 2006)
- 7: broelan (Oct 13, 2006)
- 8: Number Six (Oct 13, 2006)
- 9: Researcher 556780 (Oct 29, 2006)
- 10: Number Six (Oct 29, 2006)
- 11: There is only one thing worse than being Gosho, and that is not being Gosho (Oct 29, 2006)
- 12: rev. paperboy (god is an iron) (Dec 13, 2006)
- 13: Crazyace (Dec 13, 2006)
- 14: Number Six (Jun 2, 2009)
- 15: There is only one thing worse than being Gosho, and that is not being Gosho (Jun 2, 2009)
- 16: Number Six (Jun 2, 2009)
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