Clinton: 'You Can't Tell How Far a Frog Will Jump Until You Punch Him'
May 29, 2008 4:53 PMABC News' Eloise Harper Reports: Facing an increasingly improbable candidacy for the White House, Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., showed no signs of stopping on the trail in South Dakota and cited an old Arkansas, saying in an off-handed reference to her campaign: "you can't tell how far a frog will jump until you punch him."
Is that REALLY an old Arkansas saying? Do they punch frogs often in Arkansas?
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American Frog Proverbs
Sr. Hillary's reference might be true but it is the only one I have ever read that mentions hitting a frog to make it jump. Here are a few variations on the theme of jumping frogs:
1. You can't tell a frog by the size of his jump.
2. Never judge the size of a frog by the length of his jump.
3. You can never tell by the looks of a frog how far he can jump.
Here are a few that I believe are apropos to Sr. Hillary's situation:
1. If frogs had wings, they wouldn't bump their asses on rocks.
2. When a frog flies into a passion, the pond knows nothing of his tantrum.
3. There is more than one frog in the puddle.
Wow!
When a frog flies into a passion, the pond knows nothing of his tantrum.
Good one!
My paternal grandmother, who
My paternal grandmother, who I have mentioned previously on this site, used to say that it was a mighty poor frog that won't praise its own pond. For many years I just assumed that her proverb was American in origin until I ran across an eerily similar phrase, although the animal referred to was a lizard, in Chinua Achebe's masterpiece "Things Fall Apart".
The proverb: "When a frog flies into a passion, the pond knows nothing of his tantrum" also strikes me as being more African than American in its origin because of its rhythm and gentle sense of earthly indifference to human emotion that is a staple of African proverbs.
Yay, Gran!
I should have guessed Grandma figured in this one. Sounds totally zen to me.