Does/can anyone tell me the meaning or start of “Vim and Vinegar”. I can’t even come very close to guessing “Vim”, and “Vinegar” maybe because it is an astringent liquid that would make one get up and go?

Welcome to the board.

Phrase Finder has a discussion of “piss and vinegar” which may have become confused with “vim and vigour” lately. “Vim” used to be a fairly common word, coming from Latin. The Dutch even have a powdered cleanser called “Vim”, meaning ultimately force.

Phrase Finder claims John Steinbeck is the earliest known citation for “piss and vinegar”. Others here may be able to narrow it down better. Note, however, that the last sentence in the link mispells “vig” for “vim”:

http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/145600.html

It’s pretty hard to translate, but there was an old advertizing slogan that Vim had: “Doet Uw voordeel met Vim!” To which some wags responded “En doet Uw achterdeel met Ajax.”

(Do your advantage [literally front-piece] with Vim ... and do your behind with Ajax.)

Why “Bet on this”, irishmick?  Is it an Irish saying?

Perhaps “vim and vinegar” ought to be “Vim and vinegar”, both Vim and vinegar being used for cleaning things.  It is probably the case that it derives from “vim and vigour”, though.

He must have a bet on one version or the other. I have never heard “vim and vinegar”, only “piss and vinegar”, and “vim and vigour”.

Welcome, IrishMick.

For future reference the topic heading should always contain the word or words in question, to facilitate subsequent searches. (All topics become part of the ever-expanding WordOrigins archive.)

Fairly certain Vim (the powder cleaner) used to be on sale in the UK too, along with Ajax.

I have never heard “vim and vinegar”, only “piss and vinegar”, and “vim and vigour”.

Same here.

bayard - 14 May 2007 11:53 PM

Why “Bet on this”, irishmick?  Is it an Irish saying?

I can’t say I ever heard it, or heard of it, in all the time I lived in Ireland.

Count me in as another one who’s heard of piss and vinegar as well as vim and vigour. Never vim and vinegar, though.
Or vim and piss, for that matter - though I bet Vim and piss would release some pretty eye-watering fumes.

To elaborate on papawswrenchs’ comment, I think the OP’s title simply meant “Help, [I have a] bet on this!”

How to determine the winner of a bet about the origin of phrase that is actually a muddled conflation of two different common expressions is harder problem.

though I bet Vim and piss would release some pretty eye-watering fumes.

Oh yeah, if Vim contains hypochlorite bleach.  Urea plus hypochlorite makes chloramine.

I thank you all for the nice, quick, concise replies! I think that our bet should be called a draw as the saying we should have been using should have been,,"Vim and Vigour"…
Somehow we had “piss and vinegar” mixed in with disagreement…

Somehow, once we had let the wrong phrase be questioned and once the argument was started there was no logical nor rational thinking involved! If there was, it was very little.
I did learn one new item as I had never heard of “Vim” prior to this, so next time in the UK I will have to but some...Again thanks.....