[muglo] Re: TTFN

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On 24-Jan-05, at 9:14 AM, Susan wrote:
> and where, Tee, does tata come from meaning good bye?
>
> Susan

After a simple google I found this.
http://www.hopstudios.com/nep/column/real_origin_of_ttfn.html
Two months ago, I wrote definitively that Disney came up with the 
phrase "TTFN," meaning, "Ta Ta For Now." But, as sometimes happens when 
I'm trying to be authoritative, I was 95% wrong.

The phrase "TTFN" does stand for "Ta Ta For Now," and it is currently 
heard mostly from Tigger. But it appeared in the media much earlier 
than that, in a WWII BBC radio show called "It's That Man Again", 
otherwise known as ITMA, that ran ten years from 1939 to 1949. Tommy 
Handley was the host of this weekly comedy show, featuring a stable of 
regular quirky characters and their catchphrases.

The catchphrase we're here to learn about, "TTFN," was part of a 
running joke related to the war; that, following the practice of the 
military, abbreviations were vigorously substituted for full words -- 
the name of the show, ITMA, being a prime example.

The Times Online has a WW II retrospective article that says in part, 
"Listened to now, ITMA seems to be just a succession of feeble 
catchphrases. Listened to then, though, it was a succession of terrific 
catchphrases in a war fought with catchphrases," and it was crazy 
popular, with up to forty percent of the British population tuning in.




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I am told that it was Handley himself who said TTFN at the end of each 
episode, but I can't find clear proof of that, and another source says 
it was spoken by Mrs. Mopp, the office char (cleaning lady), played by 
Dorothy Summers.

"TTFN" may have later have been helped to spread when it was adopted by 
BBC radio journalist and interviewer Jimmy Young to close his radio 
programme, though he himself disputes this -- yet many others describe 
him using the phrase. Being 31 and Canadian, I can't say one way or the 
other if this is true
TTFN,
TeeC



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