Personally, I find that this is one of those phrases which we all use, and don’t really think about why we use it. I have merrily used these two simple words for many years – and yet it is only recently that it occurred to me to question where such a notion comes from.
Before I started doing some research into this, I have to admit that I did spend more time than I probably should have trying to puzzle this scenario out. I did, however, cross out the possibility that it originally meant going to eat Edam at a windmill, with a dress code of clogs and pearl earrings.