Hand

Fishin's thread on social capital reminded me of this, it's kind of related.

Yesterday, I was talking to a friend about the fact that he doesn't want to move, but agreed to since his wife really wants to. He was talking about the fact that since he's basically doing it for her, when it comes to selecting the actual house he has some... at this point he was trying to think of the right word. I suggested, "Hand?" He looked at me totally blankly. Then I tried to explain the concept of "hand".

E.G. and I use it all the time. I think it came from Seinfeld. George usually has no hand and is trying to get some. It's kind of like leverage. The closest dictionary definition I've found is:



Ah, I just figured out how to look for it on Google. Here we go:



So it looks like it comes from "the upper hand." Hmm. We use it more generally... "I just cleaned the whole house, watched the kid for 3 hours, and made dinner. Do I have any hand yet?"

I think I answered the question I started out with -- where is it from, Seinfeld? -- but will go ahead and post. Anyone else use "hand" in this general sense? How do you use it?