4 ms·

"f-ing" and "blinding" means cursing and swearing. The "f" being obvious and "blinding" is a substitute for "bloody".

• dcminter 13y ago
  Actually I believe "blinding" is for "blimey", a (rather dated) contraction of "blind me." If that seems a little odd then you have to recall that blasphemy was once stronger than biological cussing. I'm told that the reason for some of the stranger grammatical usage of "fuck" in swearing is down to its substitution for religious words (e.g. "fuck you" for "damn you.") The chapter on swearing in Bill Bryson's "The Mother Tongue" is interesting and very amusing.
  • pcrh 13y ago
    "Blimey" does seem more likely. The urban dictionary has it as a contraction of "God blind me", which is presumably what you meant by your reference to blasphemy.
    • timthorn 13y ago
      Hence "cor blimey"
  • icebraining 13y ago
    There's also Stephen Burgen's Your Mother's Tongue, which is a whole book dedicated to European invective (in different languages). It's fun to see how the history of each culture shapes how people swear. For Edam example, it's much more common in Catholic countries to swear by blaspheming in a very strong and direct way.