‘No worries’ looks to be a simple little expression – but it’s anything but

Kate Burridge points out that when Ozzies love an expression, they play with it. No worries has generated numerous remodelled versions – notably, gloriously truncated nurries, and the more complex no wuckers/no wucks, two truncated spoonerised versions (from no fucking worries -> no wucking furries -> no wuckers/no wucks). No wuckers also shows the -ers ending, a double diminutive sometimes added to adjectives (like chockers, ‘chock-a-block’; preggers, ‘pregnant’), and also to nicknames (one of my school nicknames, Budge, was occasionally transformed – I like to think, affectionately – to Budgers). And there is more to entertain you at https://lens.monash.edu/@politics-society/2022/08/18/1384986

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One Reply to “‘No worries’ looks to be a simple little expression – but it’s anything but

  1. Hi just a clarification on Budge, it is not a shortening of Budgers, its a version of Budgie as in Budgie the Australian Bird – small and fast or a version of Budgie Smuggler – which is a colloquial term for a Speedo. To call someone Budge usually suggests their nickname is Budgie. This is term could have two inferences – either they can small and fast, or well, I am too polite, but it relates to why speedos are called ‘Budgie Smugglers’.

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