Friday 10 June 2011

Molrowing


Molrowing, according to the OED, is:

The practice of socializing with a disreputable woman.

I must do more of it. Roll on the weekend.

Nobody is quite sure where molrowing comes from. It first pops up in an 1860 dictionary of slang which explains it thus:

Molrowing, ‘out on the spree’, in company with so-called ‘gay women’. In allusion to the amatory serenadings of the London cats

So the mol would appear to be a mog. I do like the plural of serenadings, it doesn't get used as a noun nearly enough.

The great advantage of molrowing is that, as nobody normal knows what it means, you can mention it blithely without receiving censure. Put it on your CV under hobbies.


4 comments:

  1. Mrs M (a very reputable woman)10 June 2011 at 13:38

    Didn't "moll" mean a disreputable woman, a prostitute or thief, for a long time? Hence Moll Flanders' being called that, I suppose...

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  2. dsmin, a mog is a cat.

    Mrs M, yes, but, according to the first citation at least, that's unrelated.

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  3. I'm going to open a lap-dancing bar called 'Molrowvia'!

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