What does the French expression "même pas" means?
The full sentence is
J'ai même pas une excuse pour rester couchée
J'suis même pas malade
I got this from a French song. I was also wondering if it is normal to omit "ne". My rudimentary French tells me that the grammatically correct sentence should be: Je n'ai même pas une excuse pour rester couchée. Je ne suis même pas malade.
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First of all, it's very common to omit 'ne' from spoken French, especially when sung as it doesn't really matter. I would say the sentence means 'I don't even have an excuse to remain in bed'. The second would be 'I'm not very sick'. I'm not sure how 'j'suis' is pronounced but I have seen it before. 'T'es' is quite common as well. Hope that helps!
This is the kind of thing which the French do in casual conversation, but which they will criticise foreigners sharply for doing. You are quite right: there should be that little word "ne" in these sentences, but this is very casual use of language and the addition of the "ne" might have interfered with the song. So the advice is: take note, but do not imitate!
"I haven't even any excuse for staying in bed. I'm not even ill."
même pas - means "not even"; so this means:
"I haven't even got an excuse for staying in bed, I'm not even ill."
Yes, you are correct in saying that both sentences should have "ne", but yes, it is extremely common indeed to drop it in conversational French.