The Lemon Squeezy Pie That Fell Off a Log! Quiz

Answer: It really means "as easy as eating a pie" because they taste good.

There are some claims that the phrase originated in the 1920s in Australia, but it was used in the Saturday Evening Post in 1913. However, a much earlier example appeared in a Rhode Island newspaper in 1887, where an amusing story is told of two down and outs in New York, where one remarks
"You see, verever I goes, I takes avay mit me a silverspoon (sic) or a knife or somethings an' I gets two or three dollars for them. It's as easy as pie. Vye don't you try it?

Answer: candy, baby

Both Rosemary Clooney and Fred Astaire have recorded this song:

"It was just like takin' candy from a baby
'Cause I couldn't resist you from the very start
You had me around your little finger
No trouble at all for you to tip toe in my heart

It's the first time that I lost my head completely
Oh, you swept me off my feet, just one, two, three
It was just like takin' candy from a baby
The way you stole my heart away from me."

In Victorian times taking things from children was a common offence by petty criminals and was known as "the kinchin lay". You'll find it in "Oliver Twist" by Charles Dickens.
A "lay" is a scam of some kind and "kinchin" is thieves' cant connected to the German "kinder".

Answer: falling off a log

The expression recalls the old days of logging when the lumberjacks felled the trees and floated the logs down the river, standing on them and balancing as they guided them. Townies would come on vacations and be convinced that it looked easy! When they tried it they inevitably found that it was the falling off that was easy!

Answer: as easy as ABC

The alphabet is of course the first thing children learn in school. In Dickens' "Great Expectations", Pip learns his letters at a Dame School and then tries to teach the blacksmith Joe. Joe, however, only manages to recognize J and O
and spends many evenings hunting for these letters in any newspapers or books he can find.

Michael Jackson fans will recognize this song

"A B C is easy as like counting up to three
Sing a simple melody
That's how easy love can be
Now I'm gonna teach you how to sing it out
Come on, come on, come on
Let me show you what it's all about
A B C is easy as like counting up to three
Sing a simple melody
That's how easy love can be
Now I'm gonna teach you how to
Sing it out, sing it out, sing it out, sing it out
A B C is easy it's like counting up to three
Sing a simple melody
That's how easy love can be."

Answer: piece of cake

One of the most widely appreciated and imitated writers of light verse, Ogden Nash was born in Rye, New York, on August 19, 1902

Nash considered himself a "worsifier."

Among his best known lines are

"Candy
Is dandy,
But liquor
Is quicker"
and

"If called by a panther
Don't anther."

Answer: shelling peas

"Shelling Peas" is a poem by an American poet from Mississippi, Patricia Neely-Dorsey.

"Shelling Peas"
"It's summertime in the country,
And the kids buzz around like bees;
But, when that silver tub is placed on the porch,
It's time for shelling peas.
From the smallest to the oldest,
It's something we'd all do;
At first, of course, the little ones,
Didn't have a clue.
They'd watch to see just how it went,
And soon , they'd give a try;
Then look amazed as fingers stained,
As though dipped in purple dye.
When we'd first get started,
It seemed an insurmountable chore;
There looked like half a million peas,
Or maybe even more.
But, after we all got the flow,
We'd turn it into fun;
We'd have a race to see just who
Would be the first one done.
We'd each one have our own bowl,
and a paper sack;
We'd slip our fingers through the hull,
Then throw it empty back.
At last, when all the shells lay empty,
And a tub of peas was done
We'd let the grownups take the haul
Then look for some new fun."

For me the act of shelling peas is forever connected with something which must have been far from easy. It conjures up a vivid picture of my mother shelling peas and listening to our old valve radio. I am four years old and she is telling me to be quiet. Over the radio a voice is saying something I instinctively know is important, although it is only much later that I know it is Edward VIII renouncing the throne of England for Mrs Wallis Simpson!

Answer: It's a doddle.

This word denotes an endeavour that might be described as very easy. Its origin isn't clear, though it may come from the verb doddle, meaning "to totter or walk with short, unsteady steps." Doddle used as a noun appeared recently in a news story about Sir Ranulph Fiennes, a 56-year-old British explorer who set out in hopes of being the first person ever to trek alone to the North Pole. Fiennes made a similar crossing of the Antarctic in 1993, but this journey involved additional dangers, such as polar bears, which prompted a friend of Fiennes to observe:

"The Antarctic is a doddle compared with the Arctic."

Answer: A walk over

This term has its origins in horse racing. If horses are scratched from a race to such an extent that there is only one left then that horse is required to walk over the course and then he is declared the winner.

Answer: A marching dance with intricate steps

It was developed from the "Prize Walks" held in the late 19th century, generally at get-togethers on plantations in the southern US. At the conclusion of a performance of the original form of the dance in an exhibit at the 1876 Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia, an enormous cake was awarded to the winning couple. After that it was performed in minstrel shows, exclusively by men until the 1890s.

The dance also gave its name to a fairground ride which has travelled the length and breadth of the UK and near European Countries and is still a major attraction at all fairs. The 'Brooklyn Cake-Walk' is really an amazing ride, created in 1895 by Plymson and Taylor. The ride features a gangway, with a handrail, that rocks back and forth while the public walk on it, trying not to lose their balance.

Answer: Lemon Squeezy

"Easy Peasy" was originally just those two words, a simple rhyming schoolyard chant. It is likely that the manufacturers of a lemon scented dishwashing detergent presented in a squeezy bottle simply jumped on the bandwagon and their product was lauded wherever children played!