"gonzo", where did you come from?

The origin of the word gonzo is inextricably linked to writer Hunter S. Thompson, famed for his style dubbed gonzo journalism. Gonzo is a highly subjective, first-person style, characterized by distorted and exaggerated facts. Thompson first used the word in print in the 11 November 1971 issue of Rolling Stone:

But what was the story? Nobody had bothered to say. So we would have to drum it up on our own. Free Enterprise. The American Dream. Horatio Alger gone mad on drugs in Las Vegas. Do it now: pure Gonzo journalism.

Thompson explained where he got the term a year later in Stop Presses by R. Pollack:

I ask Hunter to explain. Just what is Gonzo Journalism? "Gonzo all started with Bill Cardosa, after I wrote the Kentucky Derby piece for Scanlan’s the first time I realized you could write different. And I got this note from Cardosa saying, ‘That was pure Gonzo journalism!’Some Boston word for weird, bizarre."

Thompson was wrong about it being a Boston regionalism. More likely, it is from the Italian gonzo, meaning foolish, or the Spanish ganso, meaning goose or fool.

From Thompson’s usage, the term generalized to mean anything foolish or bizarre. --www.wordorigins.org

"weird", where did you come from?

Weird is an example of a word whose most common modern meaning is quite different from its original English meaning. The word, originally a noun, dates back to Old English, where it meant fate or destiny. By the Middle English period, it was being used to refer the three Fates of Greek and Roman myth, and in Scotland this sense evolved into that of a witch. This Scottish use was Shakespeare’s inspiration for the three weird sisters in Macbeth. The modern adjective, however, does not appear until the 19th century, undoubtedly modeled on Shakespeare’s use. --www.wordorigins.org

"spitting image", where did you come from?

There are several false explanations circulating about this phrase, probably because the metaphor is not an obvious one. One is that it is a corruption of spirit and image, from the belief that people who looked alike shared a soul. Another is that it is a corruption of splitting image, referring to a person being split into two identical persons. Both of these are incorrect. They are after-the-fact explanations that are not supported by evidence. Instead, the spit is just that, saliva.

The metaphor at work is that of a person spitting out an exact replica of themself. Spitting image dates to 1901. Spitten picture is a bit earlier, dating to 1878. The very spit of is even older, dating to 1825. And use of the metaphor of fathers spitting out look-alike sons dates to at least 1400.-- www.wordorigins.org