Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with idioms

On MeFi, all portents of doom are typed...

l33tpolicywonk — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 12:41:39 -0800

Is it "writing on the wall" or "handwriting on the wall"? When / how did it change in popular usage? Since my childhood I've been used to hearing the idiom "writing on the wall" to describe a portent of doom. It seems like just in the last few years I've heard the variation "handwriting on the wall" and stopped hearing "writing on the wall" entirely. I've deduced from searching online that they're interchangeable and the idiom comes from the Bible, so it is subject to different translations, obviously. Has anyone else noticed this shift? Is there a definite reason why "hand" would be appended to the expression in the last few years?

If I rub dirt on it, it'll get infected!

pdb — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 11:00:02 -0800

What if I just want to walk it off? Over the last couple weeks, I have heard several friends use the phrase "just rub some dirt on it and you'll be fine" as a joking response to someone that had an injury, and I myself have used this phrase a lot throughout my adult life.

I love it, but I realized the other day that I have absolutely no idea where this originated. I always heard it in a baseball context as a kid, but was this something that came from a movie/tv show, or is it just one of those great-yet-probably-apocryphal pieces of folk wisdom whose origins are lost to the mists of time at this point? I would love to know where this phrase got its start.

Shoot for the moon...

Muirwylde — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 20:20:19 -0800

Got space-related idioms and phrases? "Cool your jets", "Jumpin' Jupiter!", "Heavens to Mergatroid!", "Over the moon!", "Off like a rocket!", "Out of this world"... So fellow space cadets...got any space-themed idioms and phrases I can add to this rather short list? I'm stumped. I know a lot of these are 50-60's era but don't want to preclude older vintage and more modern phrases. What'cha got metamind?

pulsus a mortuus equus

usonian — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 16:44:31 -0800

I'm looking for a Latin translation of an American colloquialism (knowing that such translations are at best approximations/don't work because the idiom never existed in Latin.) I'm hoping the hive mind can help translate this phrase (which I should stress refers to the poor treatment of horses back in the day) into Latin:

"Rode Hard and Put Away Wet"

I've spent some time with Latin translators and dictionaries and may have gotten part of the way there, but never having taken any Latin I'm sure it's crude at best. I found the verbs "equito" (to ride a horse,) and "repono" (to deposit or store) and the adjectives "severiter" (harshly) and "madidus" (wet/moist/damp.) So, my uninformed attempt to string these together comes out as:

"Equito Severiter Et Repono Ut Madidus"

Which, when run through a translator comes out to:

"To ride harshly and to deposit when wet"

Am I in the ballpark? I appreciate any refinements you scholarly types can offer.

Throw me a bone

geronimo's folly — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 16:43:16 -0800

Hello! I am working on a cartoony illustration in which I am conveying physical human afflictions/parts of the anatomy that could have very literal visual translations. Some examples: a frog in your throat (temporary hoarseness because of phlegm or mucus). Tennis elbow (Lateral Epicondylitis), smoker's lung, kidney stones, funny bone (humerus). I am trying to represent different parts of the body in a cartoony way. For tennis elbow mentioned above, I would put a tennis racket where the forearm and arm meet. For funny bone, I could have the humerus with a clown's nose or something. It's a simple concept, but I think it's rich with examples that I haven't thought of yet. Viral, bacterial infections are a possibility, though I am thinking more on the macro level. Thank you!

Easy Street, maybe?

srrh — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 22:53:57 -0800

What does the insult "There are street named after her" mean? A friend of mine was complaining to me about a mutual friend of ours, doing some things she considered to be selfish and greedy. She ended her rant by saying, "There are streets named after her!!" I didn't ask her what it meant at the time, it would be strange to do so now, but I cannot get this out of my head. What the heck does it mean?

She put on her jumper, drove to my flat, and is now happily wrapped

raztaj — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 18:18:54 -0800

Wrapped up in British English filter, with Earlier today, a lovely British lady and her daughter picked up a piece of furniture that I listed on Craigslist. She just sent me a follow-up thank you e-mail (never had that before, which was nice!) and said:

"Thank you very much for the CD holder, am wrapped!"

What does "wrapped" in this context mean? I assume it is positive, since it is preceded by a "thank you" and followed by a ":o)" but am wholly perplexed on what is meant by "wrapped."

Can any MeFi Brits or British English experts provide any thoughts on this?

What we talk about when we do the nasty.

idiopath — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 19:39:06 -0800

I am interested in phrases used during sex in various languages in dialects. In particular, I am interested in various idioms of lovemaking, i.e. I have observed North American men and women both tend to say 'Oh Jesus' or 'Oh God' even if they are not Christian, or not religious; they will also say "fuck me", but usually only if being penetrated. I have heard a Mexican say "Ay Papi" and a French woman say "Oui, c'est bon". I know some of these things can be very individual, but I imagine that certain phrases are common enough to make note of.

when you say jump, i say stfu?

raztaj — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 07:27:27 -0800

I'm looking for sayings/proverbs/idioms etc. that convey or state, of one refusing to be told what to do (or think, or say). "When I say jump, you'll ask: 'how high?'" -- the *opposite* of something like this. Quite simply, I'm looking for short sayings dealing with refusing to respond to the beck and call of a higher authority (whether it be socially, political, religious, or another dimension.) Any ideas?

What's the deal, Banana Peel?

dogmom — Mon, 12 Nov 2007 13:00:32 -0800

Rhyming Idioms: I know a couple of 4-year-olds that were rather tickled when I asked them "What's new, tennis shoe" They begged me for more... So I gave them "What's the deal, Banana Peel", "What's up, Buttercup" and of course, "See you later, Alligator" with it's "After while, Crocodile". If it's ok with Mom & Dad, I'm going to teach them the chorus to "50 Ways To Leave Your Lover", but can you think of any more rhyming idioms that are 4-year-old appropriate?

Hey, it's a free country

ALongDecember — Fri, 26 Oct 2007 08:44:40 -0800

Do other non-U.S. countries/cultures use the phrase "It's a free country?" To my best knownledge, this phrase is used in a few ways, and of course Simpsons quotes can be used as examples:

1. To say "yes" to a simple request.

Skinner: Mind if I sit down?
Krabappel: It's a free country.

2. To say that an impossible goal can be achieved.

Dr. Nick: With my diet, you can eat all you want, any time you want.
Marge: And you lose weight?
Dr. Nick: Uh, you might. It's a free country!

3. To state why a person is allowed to do anything they want to.

Lisa: Bart, just get outta here.
Bart: Hey: it's a free country. _You_ get out.

This phrase seems to be used often in the United States (it's shown up a few times on AskMe) but I'm not sure if it's used in other "free" countries. Is there a similar phrase in other nations? I was wondering if the idea of relating essential rights and liberties to trivial things is a uniquely American phenomenon.

So answer if you want to. Or don't. It's a free country.

Help with an idiom

pasici — Wed, 18 Apr 2007 06:10:54 -0800

Is the expression "Too many chiefs, not enough indians" culturally insensitive? If so, help me think of a clever way of expressing the same idea using the same "too many x, not enough y" format.

Why a horse in "so hungry I could eat a horse"?

23skidoo — Sun, 19 Nov 2006 06:41:44 -0800

Does "I'm so hungry I could eat a horse" mean "I'm so hungry I could eat at much meat as is on a horse's bones (without getting full)" or "I'm so hungry I'd be willing to eat something as (presumably) unappetizing as horse meat"? Basically, does the horse signify a great amount of food, or a disgusting quality of food?

Festive Pants?

klangklangston — Mon, 06 Nov 2006 10:40:59 -0800

Idiom filter: Party Pants. I was watching Cien Mexicanos Dijeron (the Unavision version of Family Fued) with my girlfriend, when they got to the final stage, where two people try to answer quick questions with the most popular answers. We didn't manage to catch the first contestant's answer, nor the question, and the second contestant was clearly just spitballing with her answer of what we believe was "cepillo de dientes" (toothbrush). According to the the host, the most popular answer was "pantalones festivos." Festive pants? What the hell? First off, we assume that this is an idiom, and the woman groaned like she couldn't imagine not giving festive pants as an answer. So what the hell are pantalones festivos?
Second, what catagory could both a toothbrush and festive pants fall into? Her answer of a toothbrush got, like, three points, which means that it wasn't totally alien, just not a good guess at all.

This has led to rampant and oft-hilarious speculation in my circle of friends, but even those who took Spanish at university levels are still totally clueless as to what pantalones festivos means. (And we do have that right— it was spelled out as the most popular option on the board, though sometimes they do abbreviate common phrases so it might be missing a word or two at the end or something). And there's only one result on Google, which doesn't provide much context.

Colloquialism

jasondigitized — Tue, 31 Oct 2006 07:42:54 -0800

What is your favorite and most colorful expression or phrase? Speaking about two idiots that we work with, my coworker said that they looked like 'Two monkey's f*cking a football', which led me to say 'They couldn't organize a piss-up in a brewery', and as a final touch, which made me laugh, my coworker states 'They're about as handy as a bear cub with a toothpick'. I would love to write a book or create a website with colorful phrases from around the world. What are some of your favorite idioms that you use or have overhead in the boardroom, bar, or barnyard?

Teaching a teenager English-language idioms

ClaudiaCenter — Thu, 14 Sep 2006 17:48:37 -0800

Help me come up with a list of cool English-language idioms to teach my teenage foster daughter from Taiwan. Slightly I know there have been discussions here before about English language idioms, but I didn't see one that fit exactly.

My 16-year-old foster daughter (very proficient in English, but not yet 100 percent fluent -- she was born in the US but lived for ten years in Taiwan) is interested in learning English idioms, and I would like to help her. Although I can buy her books or show her lists on the internet, I would mostly like to introduce idioms in conversations with her.

The ones we both seem to like are those idioms that have an accessible/visual image or explanation. So, for example, she liked "sticky fingers" for the idea of the loot sticking to the hand of the thief. She likes "tip of the iceberg" because I explained about how the non-visible part of icebergs under water is bigger than the visible part.

She also likes idioms that are somewhat off-color, though I would like to only encourage witty & amusing off-color idioms.

Also, I think overly obscure idioms might cause confusion and ridicule, so while I'd love to see historic web sites tracking slang of the 1890s (I know this crowd!), I probably won't teach her those.

So ... favorite internet sites? favorite idiom?

paging all rocket scientists..

petsounds — Wed, 05 Jul 2006 09:26:43 -0800

whats the origin of the phrase 'you dont have to be a rocket scientist..? any idea when/where this phrase came into popularity? did it arise spontaneously or did it come from movie or something? i remember my dad used to say 'well it doesnt take a rocket scientist..' as a polite way to tell me im stupid and i always thought he made it up until i heard other people use it. also why do we hold rocket scientists in such high esteem?

Combative non-sequitur retorts?

evariste — Wed, 22 Mar 2006 21:49:57 -0800

IdiomaticFilter...: One of the funniest skits on Chappelle Show is the OJ Simpson jury selection, where Dave says to the prosecutor that "Some people say that cucumbers taste better pickled". I found it hilarious, and I want to know more quaint, idiomatic retorts in that spirit.

Idioms poster

MrMulan — Tue, 13 Dec 2005 05:36:00 -0800

Please help me find a print depicting idioms and slang. Back in college, my suitemate had this large poster of animated idioms and slang. Suggestions for any other type of "busy" artwork, posters, sculptures is appreciated. I want to start exposing my son to it.

AI a dead man on the floor with a bucket on one leg and the head of a frog=He kicked the bucket. He croaked.
A man and woman dressed up painting the side of the building red=Painting the town red
A man with a head expanded like a baloon with a belt squeezing his waist=He's full of hot air. Tightening his belt.
This are the only three that come to mind easily that where on the poster.

This was a really busy picture, and I would spend hours staring at it(high), but never bothered to get the name of it(or forgot).

Source of the expression "give it the old college try"?

cmyr — Sat, 29 Jan 2005 12:38:54 -0800

Language/idioms/etc: I'm wondering about the source of the expression "give it the old college try". Google offers tons of examples, but nothing concrete.

Who's the Pete, for Pete's sake?

rorycberger — Sat, 03 Jul 2004 18:10:40 -0800

"For Pete's sake!" Who's Pete?

Shaking a Stick

badstone — Tue, 20 Jan 2004 14:39:52 -0800

How much stuff can the average person shake a stick at? I've done some googling to find the origins of the phrase: "More than you can shake a stick at....", and the typical result is this one, which throws out some guesses and early usages, but cannot come up with the real answer. Does anybody know where the phrase really comes from?