I feel as though I've heard it. And not in the way of asking a boy how he did something. It would be more exclamatory like, "BOY HOW, that building is TALLL!"

If it's relevant I live in the southern US

I'm not an etymology expert, like I know jack shit about diddly squat when it comes to this stuff, but I thought this might be a relevant question for you guys. I couldn't really find anything on the first page of Google and reddit is more fun anyway.

ie. plaque on your teeth vs plaque award vs plaque to read (ie. museums)

did they come from the same root?

Two years ago I had a successful kickstarter etymology card game. Now it's a video game!

https://www.etymologygame.com/

$200: This adjective describes when a city (or two cities?) has a dark underbelly of squalid poverty, like in 19th Century Victorian London. What is Dickensian?

$400: This adjective alluding to pleasure gained from cruelty or violence has its roots in the works of a 16th-17th century French nobleman. What is Sadistic?

$600: This adjective can used to describe the type of totalitarian oppressive dystopia evident in a 1949 classic book. What is Orwellian?

$800: The word for this type of idealistic impractical behavior comes from the name of a 16th-17th Spanish author’s delusional (but chivalrous) character. What is Quixotic?

$1000: This word is appropriate to describe being stuck in a maze of senseless bureaucracy or illogical frustrating situations like those in a certain Prague born author’s writing. What is Kafkaesque?

I always assumed “midriff” was an opaque word, but it breaks down pretty cleanly. It comes from Old English midhrif: midd “middle” + hrif “belly, womb.”

Hrif goes back to Proto-Germanic *hrifiz, with cognates like Old Frisian rif “belly” and Old High German href “body, womb.” It died out in English as a standalone word and survives only as a fossil inside “midriff.”

Further back, *hrifiz is usually traced to PIE *kʷrep- “body, form, appearance.” That same root is the commonly cited source of Latin corpus “body,” which would make “midriff” a very distant relative of corpse.

According to a web-site called ‘etymonline’ (I am unsure if this is a reliable source or not as am not well-versed in etymology itself), the english comes from a meaning about blood.

‘Middle English blessen, from Old English bletsian, bledsian, Northumbrian bloedsian"to consecrate by a religious rite, make holy, give thanks," from Proto-Germanic \blodison"hallow with blood, mark with blood," from *blotham* "blood" (see blood (n.)). Originally a blood sprinkling on pagan altars.’

— etymonline entry

I know, from personal experience, that the French verb se blesser means to injure or hurt oneself, which one can certainly link to blood, quite easily. Is there an actual link between these words, or is it just happenstance?