'Rabbits, rabbits, rabbits.'

[smellingbottle.livejournal.com]

This is an entirely trivial question I have long meant to ask here.

Could some kind soul please enlighten me as to why Lawrie, in response to Nick waking her on New Year's day in Run Away Home, says 'Rabbits, rabbits, rabbits'? To which Nicola responds 'Oh, rabbits, yes, I'd forgotten', after which we're told 'But was too late. She'd spoken.'

Is this somehow connected to bringing good luck in the New Year? (You say 'rabbits' before saying anything else? You invoke the talismanic power of the New Year Bunny?) Although at breakfast Lawrie is perturbed at having forgotten to see in the New Year the night before, and has to be consoled by Giles saying that having eaten twelve mince pies will balance out the bad luck - which I'd never come across before either. Clearly my New Years are very culturally impoverished.

ETA: Thanks, everyone. This was completely unfamiliar to me, and my new-found knowledge has made me resolve never to share a bed with any of you on the first of the month.

Comments

[cangetmad.livejournal.com]

It's not just New Year's: it's the first of every month. I think the first person to say "rabbits" gets good luck? There's also "a pinch and a punch for the first of the month", which only the first person to say it gets to bestow.

[beth213.livejournal.com]

I remember it being "white rabbits, white rabbits, white rabbits" for 1st of March only - then the "pinch, punch" for other months. No idea why, though!
We had various replies to the "pinch, punch" one - "a punch and a kick for being so quick" and so on...

[cangetmad.livejournal.com]

We had "a pinch and a kick for being so quick", which at least seems equal in pain and worth the tradeoff - I don't think I'd take a pinch and a punch of my sister for a punch and a kick from her.

[smellingbottle.livejournal.com]

Sheesh. My life has been a sheltered one. Thank you, though. Load off my mind.

[stellanova.livejournal.com]

Heavens, I have never heard of this before. Funny what sayings and traditions transcend the Irish sea and what don't!

[smellingbottle.livejournal.com]

I was just thinking the same thing. Then again, in neither my native nor adopted country am I renowned for my early morning bon mots.

[rosathome.livejournal.com]

We had 'white rabbits' too - for the 1st of every month.

And then 'a pinch and and a punch for the first of the month' to which you could reply 'a slap and a kick for being so quick' unless, of course, they were clever enough to add 'no returns'. Pointless and irritating.

Don't know about the mince pies, though.

[richenda.livejournal.com]

There are different local traditions about this.
Sometimes it's the first of every month, sometimes it's certain months.

Thi comes into either Guard Your Daughters (Tutton) or I Capture The Castle (Dodie Smith)

[oursin.livejournal.com]

Guard Your Daughters which has a variation I've never come across elsewhere: saying 'Hares' the last thing on last night of the old month and 'Rabbits' first thing on the first day of the new month.

I was brought up on 'White rabbits' x 3, first of every month. Supposed to bring a lucky month.

[(Anonymous)]

I learnt it (in Gloucestershire) as only when there is an R in the month (so not May June July August)

[white_hart]

We always said 'white rabbits, white rabbits' on the first of the month, except in March, when it was 'rabbits and hares'. It had to be the first thing you said, and as others have said it was a good-luck charm for the coming month.

[thekumquat.livejournal.com]

Ditto, except for always being white rabbits (down in Surrey and Sussex), although my partner from Leicester claims it's always rabbits and hares.

[white_hart]

I was born in Hampshire, and both my parents grew up there, so that suggests it may not necessarily be a regional thing...

[rosathome.livejournal.com]

And I learnt it at boarding school...

[elizahonig.livejournal.com]

And I learned to say "rabbit, rabbit, rabbit" upon waking up on the first day of the month when I was at Bryn Mawr, in the USA; but we were very Anglophile so this does not speak at all to general American practices. We also sang a hymn to the sun, in Greek, from the top of a stone tower (design based on Magdalene College, we were told) at dawn on May Day.

[oursin.livejournal.com]

Oh yes, and I think the mince-pies is just Giles being a great big brother tease.

[white_hart]

I'm sure I've heard of there being a superstition about it being lucky to eat a mince pie for every month of the coming year. Although I may have made that up from Run Away Home, of course!

[balooky.livejournal.com]

There's a Spanish tradition of eating 12 grapes at midnight on New Year's Eve, I thought Giles was only teasing about the mince pies.

[mrs-redboots.livejournal.com]

At my boarding-school we said "Black Hares" last thing at night on the last day of every month, and "White Rabbits" first thing in the morning. And for some reason we came downstairs backwards on the first morning of each month, too.

And our family had the traditional thought that each mince pie you ate during the festive season would bring you a lucky month in the coming year - I suppose because they were traditionally only eaten during the Twelve Days of Christmas, so if you had one every day... Wouldn't do nowadays, when they're on sale all year round!

Similarly, catching a leaf as it blew from the tree was supposed to bring you a lucky month, although I think it was only either in October and November, and cannot now remember which.

[pisica.livejournal.com]

The version I heard, which is American, is saying 'bunny bunny' or 'rabbit rabbit' on the first day of the month. Someone (a comedian) quipped that because his family was Jewish they said 'rabbi rabbi'....

rabbits - and mince pies

[rigmarole1.livejournal.com]

As well as the analogous Spanish custom, you could compare the one mentioned by Jose Saramago, A Year in the Death of Ricardo Reis transl. Giovanni Pontiero (Harvill; London, 1992) p.57; set in Lisbon over New Year 1935-6. The custom is of twelve raisins taken one by one to accompany each stroke of the midnight hour, to bring good luck in the coming year. Definitely not just a big brother tease.