When examined, or just because it’s weird on its own.
Example: Beat a dead horse
- You whip a horse to go faster
- It dies from being whipped too much
- You still want the horse to go faster
- You continue to whip it
Break a leg
How does telling someone to sustain serious injuries imply you want them to succeed?
My understanding is that that was the original intention of the phrase. It’s meant to be ironic but then the irony was lost as the phrase got more popular
“Run like you’ve never ran before” suggests that you’d probably suck at running.
“I’m not here to fuck spiders” - said by Australians who want to drop the preamble and get down to business.
And here I was, just assuming that to be true about most people…
How inconsiderate of me.Well, it’s Australia. Spiders have the vote.
That’s hilarious, I should try that out
Nah, surprise everyone.
Leap into the room, exclaim “I’m here to fuck spiders”, then drop trou and hump a cobweb.
Keep the bastards guessing
“There’s more than one way to skin a cat.”
- You have a cat.
- You wish to remove its skin.
- You realize there’s more than just one method to accomplish this unusual task.
- You state this proudly as a metaphor for problem-solving flexibility.
Related: a small room that “doesn’t have enough room to swing a cat”.
Does the pope shit in the woods?
A humerous combo of ‘Do bears shit in the woods?’ and ‘Is the Pope Catholic?’ Which are two jokey ways of saying ‘Yeah, obviously, duh’.
My wife used to work in the backcountry. Lots of unpaved remote roads. Bears apparently do not shit in the woods. They shit on the road.
Do they, or did someone put a road through a bear’s outhouse?
Ironically, from a truck driver I learned bears seem to shit an awful lot in the roadway.
But does the pope shit in the woods?
No, but bears are catholic
No, he’s trapped in the pope mobile , that thing isn’t equipped for offroad travel
It’s raining cats and dogs.
Somehow, heavy rain is represented by a downpour of household animals.
The household animals are not pouring down. This saying describes rainfall that is so powerful that it washes away the dead cats and dogs lying in the gutter in medieval cities.
Interesting. I always thought it was because the rain was so heavy it drove all the strays to seek shelter, so people noticed a lot more cats and dogs in front of their homes. I think a grade school teacher told me that when I was a kid. I like the dead animal version better.
This one is because when houses had straw roofs, cats and dogs would sit up there, and come down in the rain.
It’s previously rained frogs or fish from clouds, at certain times throughout history.
So, cats and dogs is an even more intense version of that maybe.
“Quitting cold turkey” - I never actually thought about this one, but apparently it’s directly related to addiction (which seems kind of obvious now that I do think about it). When you quit an addiction abruptly, you sometimes get that cold goosebump skin like a cold turkey.
Goosebumps like from a goose? Why isn’t it called ‘going cold goose’ then?
I don’t know, but it just doesn’t roll off the tongue the way “cold turkey” does.
Hoisted by my own petard (to be foiled by your own plan), is a nice flowery one, although it actually makes sense. The bee’s knees (for something excellent) is a good one that makes no sense. Wet behind the ears (inexperienced) is another cool one.
Is ‘Wet behind the ears’ a comparison to a newborn baby?
It is indeed
“The dogs bollocks” is another, same as bees knees.
“Hoisted by your own petard” is from Hamlet. Equivalent to “It blew up in your own face” but with more of a cause of hippocracy
The french used to use an explosive device called a “petard” (old french for a fart), that was used to breach doors. However these would sometimes blow back and kill the user rather than breach the door. This was the original intention for the Shakespearian phrase. One was Hoisted (old verb* not used anymore but essentially blown off their feet) by their own Petard (or door breaching bomb).
More information is here: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoist_with_his_own_petard
*Unrelated to hoist as in to lift, despite similarities
Whats up
How’s it hangin’?
Catch you on the flip side.
Stay fresh cheese bags
In Northern Ireland (Belfast especially), we sometimes say “bout ye?” as a greeting. It’s just “what about you?” but actually meaning “how are you?”
Often it’s just used as an alternative to “hello” or “hi”, and you’re not actually asking the person how they are.
“Reet” in Yorkshire.
*North of Ireland
Dollars to donuts.
WTF does it even mean?
I’m so sure that this thing will happen, that I’m willing to make a bet whereby I’ll pay you dollars if it doesn’t happen, and you pay me donuts if it does. I feel like I’m getting free donuts and my dollars are not at risk.
Well, back in the day, a doughnut cost a lot less than a donut.
So, betting dollars against donuts would be a bad idea.
Not that it was ever a betting term, it just condone contains a reference to betting.
It’s like saying “hey, lets get dinner. You give me a twig for every dollar I put in.”
You’re either exchanging something of unequal value, or making an “investment” where you get very little return on it.
My wife has worked with lots of people who are not native English speakers who are sometimes taken aback by the idioms. One colleague flat out refused to accept that “FOMO” is a word.
I suggested that she is in a position to make some up, like “Let’s not put fish in the milk bucket.” But she didn’t go for it. I guess she’s not an agent of chaos after all :/
“Let’s not put fish in the milk bucket.”
Honestly better than many other common sayings.
You’ve got to mold that silicone or you’ll never be fulfilled.
“scientists say…”
They aren’t some unified entity. They don’t even agree amongst themselves on most things if one digs deep enough. While there is some interpretation of the data involved, most people that use the phrase “Scientists say…” are essentially saying “Objective observations done by several of the smartest humans have been argued over by several of their rivals resulting in…”
Like, we should start calling them something like Observational Data Warriors ™ /s to put perspective on the magnitude of information and depth involved. You can have an opinion but you are a coward of no relevant value if you are not trained for battle and fighting on the front lines. So whatever nonsense you have to say results in you looking like a clown of no note.
Scientists say "im off to work dear, see you this afternoon”.
but seriously, we have to trust experts in STEM just to get through our day. Every time someone give the "scientists can be wrong too” line i look up at the ceiling as if its about to collapse. Sure science is about continuous improvement and falsifiability but that guys PHD is not equivalent to your youtube recomendations pipeline.
Head over heels.
So… Standing?
I’ve read that it used to be “heels over head” as in upside-down, but then somehow the words got switched around (I found this page that claims the same thing: https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/head-over-heels.html ).
No I think it refers to the motion of the head going over the heels. Not being positioned in a static frame over the heels.
Taking God’s name in vain
- You invoke God on some topic you’re wrong about.
- God appears and sees your worthless comment.
- ???
- God punishes you, or he backs away, or he learns to not listen to you anymore in boy cries wolf type situation? Its really not clear what the repercussions are.
No, no, it was originally “Taking God’s name in vein,” as saying the name of God out loud would allow Him into your blood. If you say the name of God, you allow him to inhabit your blood, gain your power, and become even more mighty. The ancient Hebrews feared God gaining too much power, as He would be able to destroy the world. Then Christians figured out that if they took Communion and instead drank the blood of Christ, they could reverse the Hebrew God’s power and slowly increase their own until they could ascend to the heavens and do battle with the Almighty, empowered by His blood in their veins, rather than weakened by taking His name in vein. In this seventeen-part essay, I will describe how we can defeat God by
This lore makes more sense than the bible.
The bible is a collection of thousands of years of oral history and societal laws put to paper generations after the fact, allegory and letters to random fuckers and varying accounts of a Jewish cult leader who was executed for crimes against the state. It’s gonna have a potted narrative.
This is mind blowing if true. Is this real? What’s going on here? Are you serious?
Not real, but certainly creative.
yes everything you read on the Internet is true.
Thank you. I thought so.
But seriously. I thought this might be another Tower of Babylon incident. I could definitely see this playing out early on during the vestiges of the mythological era. I was also feeling asleep.
Note to self. Don’t comment when falling asleep.
That’s one that always bothered me too. When I say “Jesus fucking Christ” I mean it. Which is it’s own weird ism when you think about it…
I thought it was stating that something is God’s will for your own purposes. AFAIK it’s not just using terms for God as a curse.
https://www.etymonline.com/word/vain
The expression comes from the phrase “in vain” which restores the original meaning of the noun vain away from the conceited meaning and more towards the vacuous sense. So if you’re taking God’s name in vain, it’s using God’s name needlessly.
I think the idea was that he could be invoked by his name, but they couldn’t have people going around saying “Jehova” (or whatever) randomly without any cool powers happening, so they made up the rule to discourage people poking holes in their flimsy story.
