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Having a ‘whoop’ of a time thinking about ‘whoops a daisy’!

Have you seen the movie ‘Notting Hill’? Have you seen the scene where Hugh Grant keeps saying ‘whoops a daisy!’?

 

‘Whoops a daisy!’ is an expression of surprise or dismay, as shown by Hugh Grant when he fails to climb over the garden wall. The modern-day equivalent is thought to probably be ‘Doh!’ The term has been shortened to “whoops” and some people think it may be related to the expression “to whoop,” as in giving “whoops of joy.”
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With regards to the historical background of “whoop” as a verb, it relates to a falconer who whoops his hawks and dates back to the early 1400s.  If you cried ‘whoop’ during a hunt this would indicate to your fellow hunters that your quarry, your target animal, or game, was dead.
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Whoop also appears in slang, for example ‘to whoop it up’  which means to have a jolly good time, or to ‘live it up’. “Making whoopee” arose in the US around 1927. Plus, something not so pleasant, for us Brits the term “whoopsie” is apparently a child’s word for excrement. So for anyone who mixes American and British English you must be careful to be clear between making whoopie, and making whoopsie! Things could go really wrong!
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Finally, yes people really do say this! Well… I do, and so does Hugh Grant!
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