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actually i think the rules are very evident ; where it becomes complicated is that (in my understanding) often there were expressions which became standard usage (like "apples and pears" for stairs) ; since everyone knew them after a while they would either abbreviate them (just apples) or modify them somehow, so that the original rhyming correlation was lost (thus "plates" means shoes, but i don't know why, and "daisies" means feet, but again it's not immediately obvious). it's not quite so easy to understand then, if you don't already speak it.
just like originally when someone said "22" someone who had no connections to underground or criminal elements would not understand why the bar would suddenly empty. (quite a bit of slang originated so that criminals could communicate amongst themselves without being understood by the police or the "caves").
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