h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

You mean ".. and how do you BEcome one?", surely.

Not at all - the phrase is "you'll come a cropper one day." Nobody said anything about BEcoming a cropper.

I think you put him in his place!!

I beg to differ. It makes no sense to "come" anything, but here. The phrase would suggest that a cropper is something you can be, and therefore is subjective. Therefore, if you are not already a cropper, then you will only be one by becoming one. Cropper is not a place, otherwise the phrase would be "you'll come TO cropper one day" - which it is not. Therefore, stand corrected.

Then surely it's the original phrase, "you'll come a cropper" which is at fault. I stand by my question, "what is a cropper and how do you come one?"

I guessed his anagram

*smin grug*

I havn't bothered.

Actually a cropper is a part of the harness for a carriage horse

That make sence.

"be careful or you may become a bit of leather that attaches a horse to its carriage"

No a cropper is the part of the harness that attaches round the horses tail - i know this as I used to groom for a woman who did competetive carriage driving - dressage, cross country and accuracy phases before you ask.

I am pissed on champagne cocktails and I am finding difficult to type! : -)

Good, so that's half the question answered - thank you Ms L! But how do you come (or even BEcome) one?

With that kind of proximity to a horses rear end I don't think I need to know.

No I think that the term " to come a cropper" is actually a foxhunting term (oooooh we are so un PC but it is amazing how many terms we use in common speech are hunting terms). Basically i think it means to slide off the back of your horse

Always a bad thing, especially if you land head first.

Ah - suddenly it all becomes clear!

Especially when the horse of the guy behind tramples on your head...

*ooh*

Thanks, daSilva... cheerful as ever I see!

actually and this will show you how unPC I am - I have friends who have lost parents in the hunting field

I shouldn't have posted that - now I will be besieged with hate mail.

The comments in the above posting in no way reflect the views of the poster

It is a dangerous game, and my sympathies go to your friends, Lochie.

There has been a spate of horse riding related fatalities of late. I remember my first year at Staffs Uni, we lost a young Psychology lecturer (only a cpl of years older than I was at the time) to a riding accident - my friends in her department were deeply shocked.