Talk:all-elbows

RFV discussion: February–March 2022

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all-elbows

Jberkel 20:54, 3 February 2022 (UTC)

It was in a former version of the Jargon File, but was deleted for being "as dead as MS/DOS": http://www.catb.org/jargon/chaff.html. 70.172.194.25 09:55, 6 February 2022 (UTC)

With the quotes that you’ve found and added to the article, old-fashioned though the term no doubt is, surely we can consider this to have passed RFV. Overlordnat1 (talk) 14:41, 7 February 2022 (UTC)

It is not attested at all in the hyphenated spelling we have. Vox Sciurorum (talk) 14:50, 7 February 2022 (UTC)

Also, this is a specialized computer use of a more general English expression, all + body part. So you have (from Google books) "Clumsy, I would say. All elbows and knees, and nothing at all like the sensual scene from a movie." "Russell was spindly, all elbows and knees." All ears, all eyes. And surely more. Vox Sciurorum (talk) 14:55, 7 February 2022 (UTC)

I think it more likely refers to elbowing, more specifically to elbowing in on others. Chuck Entz (talk) 15:28, 7 February 2022 (UTC)

I think you’re right there. I hadn’t thought about hyphenation but perhaps we should just move the existing entry to all elbows and list all-elbows as an alternative form, if we find a hyphenated example? all elbows and knees should probably be created too, with two different definitions ‘clumsy’ and ‘spindly’. Overlordnat1 (talk) 15:49, 7 February 2022 (UTC)

RFV-passed, moved to all elbows This, that and the other (talk) 23:10, 3 March 2022 (UTC)