So the Mythbusters chick is pregnant...

[tonywojo]

To 'hunker down' means to sit tight, lay low, usually to wait until some period of crisis is past, or until further action is appropriate. I don't think 'hunker' by itself has a meaning.

Jack ta that is exactly the state Im in and ta Emily too.

[shadows on the trees]

Really???

I'm not in a state of crisis. I'm just at work.

[JackT]

It sounds like the most typically American of phrases, but it seems originally to have been Scots, first recorded in the eighteenth century.

Nobody seems to know exactly what its origin is, though it has been suggested it’s linked to the Old Norse huka, to squat; that would make it a close cousin of old Dutch huiken and modern German hocken, meaning to squat or crouch, which makes sense. That’s certainly what’s meant by the word in American English, in phrases like hunker down or on your hunkers.

The Oxford English Dictionary has a fine description of how to hunker: “squat, with the haunches, knees, and ankles acutely bent, so as to bring the hams near the heels, and throw the whole weight upon the fore part of the feet”. The advantage of this position is that you’re not only crouched close to the ground, so presenting a small target for whatever the universe chooses to throw at you, but you’re also ready to move at a moment’s notice.

Hunker down has also taken on the sense of to hide, hide out, or take shelter, whatever position you choose to do it in. This was a south-western US dialect form that was popularised by President Johnson in the mid 1960s. Despite its Scots ancestry, hunker is rare in standard British English

.

[tonywojo]

Jack ta that is exactly the state Im in and ta Emily too.

My legendary punctuation

I was just saying thank u Emily for bringing the word up

[JackT]

Who the hell is Emily?

[tonywojo]

It sounds like the most typically American of phrases, but it seems originally to have been Scots, first recorded in the eighteenth century.

Nobody seems to know exactly what its origin is, though it has been suggested it’s linked to the Old Norse huka, to squat; that would make it a close cousin of old Dutch huiken and modern German hocken, meaning to squat or crouch, which makes sense. That’s certainly what’s meant by the word in American English, in phrases like hunker down or on your hunkers.

The Oxford English Dictionary has a fine description of how to hunker: “squat, with the haunches, knees, and ankles acutely bent, so as to bring the hams near the heels, and throw the whole weight upon the fore part of the feet”. The advantage of this position is that you’re not only crouched close to the ground, so presenting a small target for whatever the universe chooses to throw at you, but you’re also ready to move at a moment’s notice.

Hunker down has also taken on the sense of to hide, hide out, or take shelter, whatever position you choose to do it in. This was a south-western US dialect form that was popularised by President Johnson in the mid 1960s. Despite its Scots ancestry, hunker is rare in standard British English

.

Like Jim Kerr?

[shadows on the trees]

That's interesting. "Crouch" was the first synonym that came to mind, but it doesn't really cover the connotation of ... well, hunkering and waiting for something to blow over.

[JackT]

Like Jim Kerr?

I don't know how to respond.

[tonywojo]

That's interesting. "Crouch" was the first synonym that came to mind, but it doesn't really cover the connotation of ... well, hunkering and waiting for something to blow over.

bean pole crouch english footy player 6foot7 and 14 stone

[JackT]

hotdog mailbox 157 xyz rack-and-pinion steering

[tonywojo]

I don't know how to respond.

Who hunkers and Mac copied him

[tonywojo]

hotdog mailbox 157 xyz rack-and-pinion steering

u taking the piss out of my writing style again?

[shadows on the trees]

Who hunkers and Mac copied him

wtf?

[JackT]

Who hunkers and Mac copied him

Speaking of Mac's hunkering, another thing I spotted him doing at a gig was holding his fingers against the side of his neck like he was checking his pulse or something. I've mentioned it before but nobody else has spotted it. He might have even done it whilst hunkering.

[shadows on the trees]

Speaking of Mac's hunkering, another thing I spotted him doing at a gig was holding his fingers against the side of his neck like he was checking his pulse or something. I've mentioned it before but nobody else has spotted it. He might have even done it whilst hunkering.

Was he singing BOTDH whilst checking his pulse? Perhaps he was afraid he had slipped into a coma.