Je me demande...

I received a text message from a French friend, and I don't understand it. He says:
Mauvais humeur quand tu nous tiens.

Don't understand the part "quand tu nous tiens"

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Permalink Reply by Crack1 on June 24, 2009 at 6:23pm

I think the word 'tiens' has the roots in the word 'tenir'. Tenir means 'have' to a great extent.

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Permalink Reply by Frank on June 24, 2009 at 6:36pm

Take it with a grain of salt. "Tenir" might mean "have", but it's pretty rare. Off the top of my head, I can't think of any example where "tenir" would mean "have".
"Tenir" is really "to hold", or "to stick", "to keep"... the idea is that it's there and it has no reason to easily go away. Either because you hold it in your hand ("tenir un stylo") or because it will last for any length of time ("je tiens à ma femme").

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Permalink Reply by Frank on June 24, 2009 at 6:31pm

"Mauvaise humeur quand tu nous tiens" is a housism.

Don't try to analyze the grammar here, it's a quirky one that only applies to proverbs and idioms.

"Mauvaise humeur" means "bad mood".

"Quand tu nous tiens" means "when you hold us"

So, a word-by-word translation would be "bad mood, when you hold us..." (the implicit end is "you don't let us go")

In a nutshell, it means that the bad mood doesn't go away.

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Permalink Reply by Crack1 on June 24, 2009 at 6:55pm

You are correct Frank.
To have is 'avoir' in French.
Tenir means hold.

I made a blunder here.