The other week at one of our tea parties, a guest asked me how my writing was going, and I said, “Oh, you know. Plugging away at it.”

My daughter, who always joins us for these parties, looked over at me like I was crazy and said, “Plugging? Seriously? That’s a phrase?”

Yes, dear. That’s a phrase. And I can prove it. 😉

Plug has been a verb since the 1620s, in the sense of filling a hole. But it’s carried the meaning of “to work energetically” from 1865. As of the turn of the twentieth century, it had also taken on the meaning of “popularize by repetition” (like advertisements plugging a new product everywhere you turn).

See, Xoe. Totally a phrase, LOL. And an apt description of the day-to-day schedule of getting up and doing what you love, even when you’re exhausted! 😉

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