The term early doors was not one that was used at all in my growing up in Greenwich and Charlton in the late fifties, sixties and seventies and my first notice of it came I think from it being used by football pundits (ex players) ? To mean soon after. I presumed that this phrase was a northern one and it still might be but it seems there is little knowledge about it in general. The ubiquitous Wiki is surprisingly shy on the etymology of it.
Still not a term I would use I doubt but I would be interested to receive the CL wisdom.
Below is all Wiki has to offer.
Etymology
When English pubs closed in the afternoon, customers who were waiting or arrived soon after the pub re-opened in the evening were known as 'early doors'.
This definition is lacking an etymology or has an incomplete etymology. You can help Wiktionary by giving it a proper etymology.
AdjectiveEdit
early doors (not comparable)
(Northern England) Early, near the start or beginning
AdverbEdit
early doors (not comparable)
(Northern England) Early; at a time before expected; sooner than usual.
NounEdit
early doors
(Cockney rhyming slang, plural only) woman's drawers.
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Comments
Jiggery-pokery
It’s not so much found these days, though it is a delightful word for describing underhand practices or dishonest manipulation of individuals for personal profit. People also mean by it some form of trickery, especially the arcane manipulation required to make an item of technical equipment work the way you want it to (“most handsets need some jiggery-pokery to be Apple compatible”; “it may lead to copied games running straight from the DVD without the need for any further jiggery pokery”).
The charm of jiggery-pokery lies partly in its bouncing rhythm, a classic example of what’s called a double dactyl, a dactyl being a stressed syllable followed by two unstressed syllables; dactyl is named after the Greek word for finger, whose joints represent the three syllables. Other examples of double dactyls are higgledy-piggledy and idiosyncrasy.
The word appears at the end of the nineteenth century and is first recorded in Wiltshire and Oxfordshire dialect. The English Dialect Dictionary quotes an Oxford example, “I was fair took in with that fellow’s jiggery-pokery over that pony.” The experts are sure that it actually comes from a Scots phrase of the seventeenth century, joukery-pawkery.
The first bit of it means underhand dealing, from a verb of obscure origin, jouk, that means to dodge or skulk; this might be linked to jink and to the American football term juke, to make a move that’s intended to deceive an opponent (the other juke, as in jukebox, has a different origin). The second bit is from pawky, a Scottish and Northern English word that can mean artful, sly, or shrewd, though it often turns up in the sense of a sardonic sense of humour.
Underrated and such a brilliant watch
🍻 to the regiment
Never saw it tne first time around, but it was recommended to me by a friend as it's being shown again on IPlayer. Couldn't stop watching it.
Brilliant series. Absolutely love it.
Edit....I've just realised the thread wasn't originally about the tv show, but it should be!!
"Will you leave me alone Eddie, I'm having a shit..."
Whoever titled that video clearly hasn’t watched much comedy.