Is the disease HOOF & MOUTH or FOOT & MOUTH?
How fitting and how timely, it seems, that all of a sudden, early into the Dububuyuh regime, the big media news story (other than the dot-com-market drop) is about Foot And Mouth Disease. Doesnít this seem like one of those things Texans are more likely to know about, than, say, city slickers or metro-area types?
And I want to know this: when did HOOFíNíMOUTH Disease morph into FOOT AND MOUTH Disease?
As kids we called it Foot-in-mouth Disease, which also seems rather apt for Dububyuh.
Doesn't hoof refer to animals, and foot refer to humans? We all know that a hoofprint is different from, say, a footprint. As plurals, the words are even more different: one hoof, many hooves. One foot, many feet.
Why the change? When the change? Obviously it is time to do a little investigating. Research, as my former broadcast colleagues would call it (of course, almost none of them really knew what research was, so the term took on a certain grandeur and charm in the biz!). I looked up Hoof And Mouth Disease. The Colombia Encyclopedia [1] refers the term right over to Foot And Mouth Disease.
Amazon lists a book [2], Hoof 'N Mouth Disease : Biblical Monologues and How to Do Them, 
by Edward Thorn. Note that there are no reviews of the book on Amazon. That's a rarity!
This book title turns out to be the old play on words, and about writing sermons. More on the play on words in a moment.
Some kid (or so it seems) named Ran in Davis, California, has a page in a website with what looks like a local area history report. From this we learn that it took from 1924 to 1926 to control the outbreak. Check out the page [3], the illustration makes it worth the click! Thereís also a photo which will probably keep you from ordering steak anytime soon.
The electric encyclopedia, aka encyclopedia.com informs us that Hoof In Mouth breakouts in Asia and South America occurred in the year 2000. Cloven-hoof animals carry this highly contagious disease, one learns. It is a virus, and was identified as such in 1897. Humans rarely catch it, but can carry it. It can also be carried in frozen foods. All this is nicely summed up in two paragraphs here [4].
Gee, I learn this sort of stuff the same evening I went to see Hannibal! Mmm, a fine Chianti might go well with this. Roger Ebert's review [5] of Hannibal, by the way, is dead-on, to coin a phrase. But I digress.
Hoof and Mouth is also a card game (in the Canasta family), the title of a play, and the name of an album by Second Story. A dancer and a monologuist call their revue Hoof And Mouth (gee, why did they leave the "disease" part out, one wonders). Adding to the allure, no doubt, may explain why there is also a restaurant named Hoof & Mouth. Remind me not to make reservations for that establishment.
We also learn that the origin of the slang term ìputting oneís foot in oneís mouthî has its derivative roots from the disease: ìfoot in mouth comes from "foot in mouth disease," a pun on "hoof and mouth disease" and the colloquial saying "put one's foot in one's mouth." From "Random House Historical Dictionary of American Slang, A-G" by J.E. Lighterî (hereís that link [6]).
ìHoofersî is a term for dancers. ìHoof Itî is slang for both being on the move, or getting out of somewhere.
Everything you could ever want to know or see about horsesí hooves can be found here [7].
Hoof and Mouth Disease, primarily an animal affliction, should not be confused with the human ailment: Hand, Foot, and Mouth Disease. That, frankly, sounds like something we should be reading or hearing about in connection with our immediate past president. Or Monica, or maybe more apropos, about Linda Tripp. I know, one should never make fun of a personís looksÖ but Linda Tripp could well suffer from either disease!
Actually, as one peruses the Google search on Hoof And Mouth, it becomes apparent that this is a worldwide concern of significant proportion. One does not want to eat pigs from Korea or Taiwan, any lamb or cow from just about anywhere else in the world, and who knows what else from wherever?!? There are accusations that US bombing of Iraq destroyed that countryís storehouse of the vaccine which was to prevent its animals from getting the disease.
I still donít know how, when, or why Hoof And Mouth became Foot and Mouth, but somehow I still suspect it has something to do with George Dubuyuh Bush.