Ask a Mexican!   Dear Mexican: I worked a summer job during
college (the late-1960s) in Southern Arizona, where most of my
co-workers were from the state of Sonora. Their favorite
expression when something was broken was, "No vale verga,"
literally, "Not worth dick," but actually meaning "totally
fucked up." What happened with this expression? When I use it
around Mexicans living in Southern California, or in Mexico,
they look at me like I am a gabacho tonto. Was this expression
limited to a northern Mexico dialect, or simply a colloquialism
that went away with the hula hoop?  Gabacho Confundido  Dear
Confused Gabacho: No, vale verga is still very much around, and
you forgot to mention its noun use to denote someone who is a
valeverga—who doesn't give a shit about anything.  I'll admit
that vale verga isn't as popular as you might remember it, but
only because it's in a curious realm of the Mexican-Spanish
vulgarity galaxy. Por one, vale verga's interjectional meaning
is overshadowed by its synonym, vale madr