Pearls Before Swine by Stephan Pastis for June 04, 2010

me too Me too Rat really

Almost as funny as the strip:

Various explanations of the origin are given:

That it is a contraction of the phrase “‘Far be’ it for me to criticize anyone, but…”

That it comes from the German word Farbe (“color”). (Many fabrics dyed with modern dyes are “too colorful” to be authentic, by comparison with their historical originals.)

That it stems from the rating of a reenactor’s portrayal as “‘Far below’” the standard.

There exists a letter dated 1 April 1863 from an A.R. Crawford in the 76th Illinois Infantry, Co D, that uses the phrase, “fallacious accoutrements & reprehensible baggage,” in description of six children posing in phony military gear during a sham reenactment that took place during the actual Civil War. Many point to this phrase as the origin of the word, citing “farb” as an acronym.

And no decent references for any of ’em!

I don’t think the food is the main point of authenticity here, I very much doubt that there were any uniformed rats in the civil war.

I’m surprised no one made a stink eye in that last panel.

Chomp chomp chomp hard gobble