OK, I’m home now. Access to my archives. This one was published on usenet (i.e., newsgroups) as “the canonical list of full-deskisms”, as in “isn’t playing with a full deck”, circa 2000:
- “Body by Fisher – brains by Mattel.”
- $HOME = /dev/null.
- 3K RAM free, no EMS.
- A .22 caliber intellect in a .357 Magnum world.
- A 10K brain attached to a 9600 baud mouth.
- A 20th century man… The guy has no future.
- A 3.5-inch drive, but data on punch cards.
- A black-and-white mind working on a color-coded problem.
- A brain like a BB in a boxcar / box of Corn Flakes.
- A butter knife in a prime rib world.
- A day late and a dollar short.
- A deadbolt with a broken cylinder.
- A flash of light, a cloud of dust, and… What was the question?
- A gross ignoramus – 144 times worse than an ordinary ignoramus.
- A hop, skip, and jump from success, but to get there he’d have to give
up chewing gum. - A kangaroo loose in her top paddock.
- A lap behind the field.
- A legend in his own mind.
- A little light in his loafers. (Apparently offensive to some? Sorry.)
- A looney tune.
- A medical mystery.
- A mental midget with the IQ of a fencepost. – Tom Waits
- A mind as empty as the sleeping pill concession at a honeymoon hotel.
- A mind like wet tennis shoes… Makes squishy noises when running.
- A modest little person, with much to be modest about. – Churchill
- A natural talent for finding subliminal messages in ice cubes.
- A Neanderthal brain in a Cro-Magnon body.
- A notch off the timing mark.
- A one-bit brain with a parity error.
- A pacifist out of necessity in a battle of wits.
- A peripheral visionary.
- A photographic memory, but the lens cover is glued on.
- A poor excuse for protoplasm.
- A prime candidate for natural deselection.
- A quart low.
- A return with no gosub.
- A room temperature IQ.
- A semitone flat on the high notes.
- A square with only three sides.
- A teapot with a cracked lid.
- A titanic intellect… In a world full of icebergs.
- A vacuum-tube brain in a microchip world.
- A VGA card and a Herc monitor.
- A victim of retroactive birth control.
- A violin minus the bow.
- A walking argument for birth control.
- A wind-up clock without a key.
- About half smart.
- Afraid she’ll void her warranty if she thinks too much.
- Airhead / bubble-brain.
- Aliens zapped him with a stupidity ray – twice.
- All booster, no payload.
- All crown, no filling.
- All foam, no beer.
- All hammer, no nail.
- All hat and no cattle.
- All he remembers about his middle name is the first letter.
- All his eggs in the same basket.
- All his learning curves look like Mount Everest.
- All icing, no cake.
- All lime and salt, no tequila.
- All missile, no warhead.
- All of his bytes are odd.
- All shot, no powder.
- All the lights don’t shine in her marquee.
- All the personality of linoleum flooring / plasticene / putty /
caulking / saran wrap / a bowl of oatmeal / a plastic spoon. - All the sex appeal of a wet paper bag.
- All wax and no wick.
- Alphabetizes junk mail / T-shirts / canonical lists.
- Always in the right place, but at the wrong time.
- Always loses battles of wits because he’s unarmed.
- Always needs to have jokes explained.
- Always responds to “Make Money Fast” postings on the Net.
- Always sharpening his sleeping skills.
- Always speaks her mind, so usually she’s speechless.
- An 8080 in a 68000 environment.
- An alligator. (All mouth, no ears.)
- An Apple //e on UUCP.
- An early example of the Peter Principle.
- An ego like a black hole.
- An example of how the dinosaurs survived for millions of years with
walnut sized brains. - An experiment in Artificial Stupidity.
- An expert on the historical significance of cottage cheese.
- An inch short and a stroke early.
- An intellect rivaled only by garden tools.
- An XT clone in a Pentium zone.
- Ano-fossal ambiguity. (Can’t tell his ass from a hole in the ground.)
- Another engineering prototype that should not have been shipped.
- Answers the door when the phone rings.
- Any similarity between him and a human being is purely coincidental.
- Any slower and he’d be in reverse. – Gignac
- As a baby his parents stood him on his soft spot.
- As bent as a corkscrew.
- As bright as a nightlight / small appliance bulb / tulip bulb.
- As focused as a fart.
- As happy as if he had brains.
- As happy as the village idiot.
- As much use as a back pocket in a vest. (Very English.)
- As much use as a lead parachute.
- As popular as a French kiss at a family reunion.
- As quick as a corpse.
- As rare as a nine bob note. (Very English.)
- As sharp as a marble / bowling ball / beachball / pin head / wet sponge
/ bowl of Jello / mashed potato sandwich, and twice as smart. - As sharp as a bag of wet mice. – Foghorn Leghorn
- As smart as a politician/lawyer is honest.
- As smart as bait / an automatic email responder script.
- As smart as Christie Brinkley is ugly.
- As thick as champ. (Irish; champ is mostly mashed spuds and cabbage.)
- As thick as two short planks / two half bricks.
- As worn out as a cucumber in a convent.
- Attic’s a little dusty.
- Back burners not fully operating.
- Bad spot on the disk.
- Baler done run out of twine.
- Bandwidth limited.
- Barney’s his hero.
- Bats have flown the belfry, and now he’s all alone.
- Bats in the belfry.
- Batteries not included.
- Been napping in front of the ion shield again.
- Been one too many times through the wormhole.
- Been playing with his wand too much.
- Been playing with the pharmacy section again.
- Been short on oxygen one time too many.
- Been using her head as a mass driver.
- Better at sex than anyone; now all he needs is a partner.
- Blew his O-rings.
- Blew the hatch before the lock sealed.
- Blocked one too many hockey pucks / soccer balls / punches with his
head. - Blown/leaking head gasket.
- Born a day late and like that ever since.
- Born during low tide in / swimming in the shallow end of the gene pool.
- Born too late – he’d have been a great Neandertal.
- Born ugly and built to last.
- Both oars in the water, but on the same side of the boat.
- Brain is running on empty.
- Brain like a hard drive with no read/write head.
- Brain permanently in power saving / 8-bit mode.
- Brain transplant donor.
- Bright as a Zippo lighter without a flint.
- Bright as Alaska in December.
- Bright as an acetylene torch – without an oxygen supply.
- Brings binoculars to submarine races.
- Broadcasts static.
- Bubbles/leaks in her think tank.
- Buddy breathing with himself. (SCUBA term.)
- Built a special showcase for his herd of pet rocks.
- Busier than a one-armed paper hanger.
- Busy as a one-legged man in an ass-kicking contest.
- Caboose seems to be pulling the engine.
- Cackles a lot, but I ain’t seen no eggs yet.
- Calling her stupid would be an insult to stupid people.
- Calling him a pea brain would be an undeserved compliment.
- Calls people to ask them their phone number.
- Can be outwitted by a jar of Marshmallow Fluff.
- Can discern facts and form predictions with the acumen of an economist.
- Can easily be confused with facts.
- Can only remember her old passwords.
- Can only shoot pool with a left-handed cue stick.
- Can’t count his balls and get the same answer twice.
- Can’t distinguish jacking off and stropping a razor.
- Can’t find his ass with two hands and a periscope/compass/flashlight/
bloodhound/GPS receiver (in a locked closet). - Can’t find his couch in the living room.
- Can’t find log base two of 65536 without a calculator.
- Can’t program his way out of a for-loop.
- Car’s only got three wheels, and one’s going flat.
- Carrier wave unmodulated.
- Carries a tire gauge in her purse.
- Cart can’t hold all the groceries.
- Cauliflower for brains.
- Changes hands and picks up a stroke.
- Charming as a carbuncle.
- Cheats when filling out opinion polls.
- Cheezwiz for brains.
- Chimney’s clogged.
- Clock doesn’t have all its numbers.
- Colder than a well-digger’s ass in the Klondike.
- Collects cards for Craig.
- Communications with him is limited to ping.
- Confused as a baby in a topless bar.
- Consumes hard drugs as vitamins.
- Contributes to collections like this one without searching first to see
if their little gem is already listed. - Contributes to the population problem.
- Could be considered a plant if he developed photrophic motility.
- Could only be loved/missed if the minister read someone else’s eulogy.
- Couldn’t balance a checkbook if Einstein helped.
- Couldn’t be shown that his ass was on fire with a flashlight and a
three-way mirror. - Couldn’t count to 21 if he were barefoot and without pants.
- Couldn’t figure it out if God gave him the instruction manual.
- Couldn’t find his way through a maze even if the rats helped him.
- Couldn’t get a clue during clue mating season in a field full of horny
clues if he smeared his body with clue musk and did the clue mating
dance. - Couldn’t get laid if he crawled up a chicken’s rear end and waited his
turn. - Couldn’t hit sand if he fell off a camel.
- Couldn’t hit the broad side of a barn if he were standing inside.
- Couldn’t hit water if he fell out of a boat.
- Couldn’t organize a piss-up in a brewery. (Common in Australia.)
- Couldn’t pour water out of a boot with instructions on the heel.
- Couldn’t tell which way the elevator was going if he had two guesses.
- Couldn’t think/pee his way out of a paper bag.
- Couldn’t write dialog for a porno flick.
- CPU is always in powersave mode.
- CPU not connected to the bus.
- Cranial cavity filled with neutronic matter. (Really dense.)
- Cranio-rectally inverted.
- Cunning as a dodo bird.
- Cursor’s flashing but there’s no response.
- Dealing with him is less fun than going to the dentist.
- Dealing with him is one angst worse than a blind date.
- Deep as her dimples / reflection in a mirror.
- Defective hard drive / boot sector.
- Dense as a London fog.
- Diarrhea of the mouth; constipation of the ideas.
- Differently clued. – Dave Clark
- Dock doesn’t quite reach the water.
- Does aerobics… in his head.
- Does everything the hard way, like making love standing up in a
hammock. - Doesn’t adjust for leap years.
- Doesn’t consider his drive a slice unless it lands two fairways over.
- Doesn’t have a fart’s prayer in a hurricane.
- Doesn’t have a round in every chamber.
- Doesn’t have all his cornflakes in one box.
- Doesn’t have all his dogs on one leash / cups in the cupboard /
groceries in the same bag. - Doesn’t have all the dots on his dice / pens in her plotter.
- Doesn’t have both oars in the water – can’t even find the damn boat.
- Doesn’t have elastic in both of his socks.
- Doesn’t have his belt through all the loops.
- Doesn’t have sixteen annas to the rupee.
- Doesn’t have the brain power to toast a crouton.
- Doesn’t have the sense God gave an animal cracker.
- Doesn’t have two neurons to rub together.
- Doesn’t just know nothing; doesn’t even suspect much.
- Doesn’t know much, but leads the league in nostril hair. – Billing
- Doesn’t know whether to scratch his watch or wind his balls.
- Doesn’t know which side the toast is buttered on.
- Doesn’t put the cross-hairs on the target.
- Doesn’t quite sample at the Nyquist rate.
- Doesn’t suffer from ear pressure when flying at altitude.
- Donated her body to science fiction.
- Donated her body to scientists… Before she was done using it.
- Downhill skiing in Iowa.
- Driveway doesn’t quite reach the garage.
- Driving at night with the lights off.
- Driving with his tailgate down (and stuff is falling out).
- Driving with two wheels in the sand.
- Dropped his second stage too soon.
- Dumb as asphalt / dirt / a mud fence / a stump / a sack of hammers.
- Dumber than a chicken / box of hair/rocks.
- During evolution his ancestors were in the control group.
- Ears are redirected to /dev/null.
- Easier to count the bricks left than the bricks missing.
- Echoes between the ears.
- Eight pawns short of a gambit.
- Elevator doesn’t go all the way to the top floor / penthouse.
- Elevator goes all the way to the top but the door doesn’t open.
- Elevator is on the ground floor and he’s pushing the Down button.
- End of season sale at the cerebral department. – Gareth Blackstock
- Enjoys listening to telemarketers.
- Enough sawdust between the ears to bed an elephant.
- Even a two button mouse gives him too many options.
- Evidence for the theory of a missing link.
- Failed the Turing test.
- Fell out of the family tree.
- Fifty-one cards short of a full deck.
- Fighting the war with a starter pistol / water pistol / pop gun / cap
gun. - Finds a flat by swapping tires.
- Finds canonical humor collections amusing.
- Finds Sesame Street / knock-knock jokes challenging.
- Fired from McDonald’s for having a short attention span.
- Fired her retro-rockets a little late.
- Flaky.
- Flat out like a lizard drinking.
- Flying on a cold shot. (Inadequate force from a steam catapult launch
on an aircraft carrier.) - Flying/landing on one engine.
- Focused like a 12 gauge shotgun.
- Fog rolled in the day he was born, and a bit of it never rolled out.
- Folds ace plus red jack hand when playing blackjack.
- For those who never forget a face, his is an exception.
- Foreign substances float in his cranial fluids.
- Forgot to pay his brain bill.
- Found his marbles, but is playing jacks with them.
- Four bits short of a full DEC.
- Four cents short of a nickel.
- Full of wisdumb.
- Full throttle, dry tank.
- Fur coat and no knickers. (Scottish expression.)
- Gasoline engine, diesel fuel.
- Gates are down, the lights are flashing, but the train isn’t coming.
- Gavel doesn’t quite hit the bench.
- Gears grind/don’t always mesh.
- Gets a charge out of pissing on electric fences.
- Gets her mail at an unknown zip code.
- Gets his orders from another planet.
- Gets hypnotized on the de-spun section.
- Gets parity errors under load.
- Gives a lot of bull for somebody what ain’t got no cattle.
- Goalie for the dart team.
- God might still use him for miracle practice.
- God’s favorite target for lightning strikes.
- Goes with the flow… He’s a bed wetter.
- Good at quantum tunneling but not much else.
- Got a life, but wasn’t sure what to do with it.
- Got his brains as a stocking stuffer.
- Got into the gene pool while the lifeguard wasn’t watching.
- Guillotining him would make only an aesthetic difference.
- Gyros are loose.
- Habits explainable if he was raised by wolves.
- Had a head crash.
- Half a bubble off plumb. – attributed to Mark Twain
- Happiness is seeing her picture on a milk carton.
- Hard to distinguish from the tail end of a horse.
- Hard to tell if he has an ace up his sleeve or if the ace is missing
from his deck altogether. - Has a bus fault problem.
- Has a face only a mother could love – but she hates it too.
- Has a few wait states.
- Has a full six-pack but lacks the plastic thing to hold them together.
- Has a leak in his ceiling.
- Has a one-way ticket on the Disoriented Express.
- Has a pulse, but that’s about all.
- Has a random memory fault.
- Has a slow clock.
- Has a sparse matrix. (Beware, “matrix” comes from the Latin “womb”.)
- Has a two-bit operating system.
- Has all her bricks, but no cement holding them together.
- Has all the brains God gave a duck’s ass.
- Has an inferiority complex, but not a very good one.
- Has an IQ one lower than it takes to grunt.
- Has change for a seven dollar bill.
- Has FINO (first in never out) memory.
- Has his brain on cruise control again.
- Has his solar panels aimed at the moon.
- Has it floored in neutral.
- Has lots of books, but all he does is lick the ink off the pages.
- Has no discretionary intellect.
- Has no upper stage.
- Has nothing to say, but delights in saying it.
- Has only one chopstick in the chowmein.
- Has over 1000 funny insults saved in a file, but can’t remember any of
them. - Has resonance where others have brains.
- Has signs on both ears saying “Space for Rent”.
- Has so few thoughts that when he free associates, it’s like watching
tennis. - Has the attention span of an overripe grapefruit.
- Has the brains of a house plant.
- Has the Grand Canyon under the crew cut.
- Has the IQ of a salad bar / an ice cube / three below houseplant.
- Has the keen awareness of an ostrich in hiding.
- Has the mental agility of a soap dish.
- Has the personality of a snail on Valium.
- Has the same talent as Dr. Doolittle.
- Has two brains; one is lost and the other is out looking for it.
- Hasn’t caught on that X and Y are relative values.
- Hasn’t got all his china in the cupboard.
- Hasn’t got the brains God gave a cat.
- Hasn’t lost his mind – it’s backed up on tape somewhere.
- Having a party in his head, but no one else is invited.
- He came, he saw, he clutched.
- He can only type in upper case.
- He can push but he can’t pop.
- He demonstrates that beauty times brains is a constant.
- He donated his brain to science but they made an early withdrawal.
- He fell out of the ugly tree and hit every branch on the way down.
- He has a bad brains-to-balls ratio.
- He hasn’t a single redeeming vice. – Oscar Wilde
- He knows computers… He’s not fit for contact with humans.
- He writes blank checks on a closed account.
- He’d be in big trouble if his wristwatch broke and he had to
- He’d screw up a two-car funeral procession.
- He’s a General Protection Fault trigger.
- He’s a man on a mission, but can’t find his dossier.
- He’s been invited to every party in town… Once.
- He’s diagnosable.
- He’s not a complete idiot – some parts are missing.
- He’s not stupid; he’s possessed by a retarded ghost.
- He’s really into himself… His head is up his ass.
- He’s so dense, light bends around him.
- He’s so dense, the Titanic wouldn’t sink in his head.
- Hears everything that a dog can.
- Hears more lyrics on records when they’re played backwards.
- Her access time approaches infinity.
- Her ancestors came to this country looking for bananas.
- Her ass is sucking swamp gas.
- Her blender doesn’t go past “mix”.
- Her brain comes with single-bit error detection and half-assed error
correction. - Her brain has a corrupted filesystem / someone needs to run fsck on her
brain. - Her brain is more like a Rube Goldberg device than a computer.
- Her cache is incoherent.
- Her dentist went deaf from the drill’s echoes.
- Her dialing thumb must be broken.
- Her ears serve the same function as holes in a dribble glass.
- Her files are compressed 100%.
- Her finals are burned out.
- Her head needs a periodic whack on the side.
- Her input pipe is broken.
- Her interrupt handler hit a loop.
- Her leads need resoldering.
- Her learning curve is fractal.
- Her lint trap is full.
- Her lists are unlinked.
- Her memory is truly random-access.
- Her mental function can be graphed with a single dot.
- Her mere presence causes parity errors, power fails, and head crashes.
- Her mind is not grounded to a logic supply.
- Her mind might have spontaneously combusted.
- Her mind would be unstable even mounted on a tripod.
- Her modem lights are on but there’s no carrier.
- Her objects are not fully oriented.
- Her phone doesn’t quite reach her desk.
- Her pool balls don’t fit into the rack.
- Her random access is the same as her sequential access.
- Her sewing machine’s been out of thread for some time now.
- Her ski lift doesn’t go to the top of the hill.
- Her stack has been corrupted.
- Her synapses are about |that| far apart.
- Her system file has zero bytes.
- Her tires are a little low.
- Her wipers don’t touch the glass.
- Her word length is zero bits.
- Hid behind the door when they passed out brains.
- High relative humidity… He’s lost in a fog.
- His .sig is long, boring, and stupid, but it’s the best part of his
postings. - His access light’s on, but the drive isn’t spinning / is still spinning
up. - His accumulator overflows at zero.
- His actual mileage varies.
- His antenna/radio doesn’t pick up all the channels/stations.
- His boot block is in a bad sector.
- His brackets are mismatched.
- His brain could be the perfect dielectric.
- His brain was sold separately and they were out of stock.
- His brain would rattle around in a gnat’s navel.
- His buffer is full.
- His clutch is slipping.
- His data bus stops for red lights.
- His deck has no face cards.
- His elevator is stuck between floors.
- His face is on a coin… On the edge.
- His family wasn’t dysfunctional until he arrived.
- His freelist is empty.
- His future is behind schedule. – Bob Thaves
- His gene line isn’t just dead, it’s extinct.
- His golf bag does not contain a full set of irons. – Robin Williams
- His grades were so bad, after school he couldn’t even get into prison.
– Shannon Sharpe - His grey matter is brown / doesn’t matter.
- His head whistles in a cross wind.
- His home page is out of order.
- His home planet is flat.
- His IQ is a false positive.
- His jack can’t get the car off the ground.
- His mind is a few Hertz off its assigned frequency.
- His mind is great at error magnification.
- His mind is less substantial than the Emperor’s new clothes.
- His mind is on vacation but his mouth is working overtime. – Allision
- His mind is write-protected/write-only.
- His mind reached escape velocity and achieved orbit.
- His mind wandered and never came back.
- His motto is: Space, the final frontier.
- His mouth rarely makes calls to his brain.
- His outgoing message starts with, “Hello, Mr. Answering Machine.”
- His page was intentionally left blank.
- His picture is in the dictionary under “zero”.
- His pointers are null/uninitialized.
- His puzzle is missing a few pieces.
- His reaction time is longer than his attention span. – Thaves
- His root file system isn’t mounted.
- His seat back is not in the full upright and locked position.
- His shared libraries aren’t installed.
- His signal-to-noise ratio is epsilon.
- His spark can’t jump the gap.
- His spirit guide is a three-toed sloth.
- His stack’s not very deep / he has an eight-byte stack.
- His strings aren’t null-terminated.
- His strip is demagnetized.
- His system administrator is never in.
- His train tracks aren’t quite parallel.
- His URL denies outside access.
- His watch dog is sleeping.
- His wisdom is stolen from bumper-stickers and T-shirts.
- Hitler’s evil twin.
- Hyperspatially interconnected / permanently disconnected neural net.
- Hypnotized as a child and couldn’t be woken.
- I wouldn’t piss in his ear if his brain was on fire.
- I’d like to buy him for what he’s worth and sell him for what he thinks
he’s worth. - If brains were bird droppings, he’d have a clean cage.
- If brains were dynamite, she wouldn’t have enough to blow her nose /
her hat off / the wax out of her ears. - If brains were farts, he couldn’t stink up the inside of a matchbox.
- If brains were gasoline, he wouldn’t have enough to drive a dinky car
around the inside of a cheerio. - If brains were grains of sand, he couldn’t fill a dixie cup.
- If brains were lard, he’d be hard pressed to grease a small pan.
- If brains were taxed, he’d get a rebate.
- If brains were water, hers wouldn’t be enough to baptize a flea.
- If God tried to help him, we’d have an eight day week.
- If he didn’t exist, he wouldn’t be worth inventing.
- If he donated his brain to science it’d set civilization back 50 years.
- If he gets any denser, the geocentric theory of the universe will come
true. - If he had a lobotomy he’d depressurize.
- If he had another brain, it would be lonely.
- If he had brains, he’d take them out and play with them.
- If he had console lights, we would see only the idle loop patterns.
- If he had half a brain, his ass would be lopsided.
- If he were any brighter he’d be in the visible spectrum.
- If he were any more stupid, he’d have to be watered twice a week.
- If her brains were put in a hummingbird, it would fly backwards.
- If his brain were a hard drive, it would back up on a single floppy.
- If his brains were money, he’d still be in debt.
- If his IQ was two points higher he’d be a rock.
- If ignorance were bliss, she’d be orgasmic.
- If it’s not in his horoscope/tea leaves, he doesn’t take it seriously.
- If not for his scrotum, he would lose his balls.
- If sex appeal were dynamite, he couldn’t blow the cobwebs off his
balls. - If she had a disk we could upgrade her with DOS 3.0.
- If she was any dumber, she’d be a green plant.
- If stupidity were a crime, he’d be number one on the Most Wanted list.
- If the government ever declared war on stupidity, he’d get nuked.
- If there were a merciful God he’d be dead by now.
- If they each had half a brain, they’d still only have half a brain.
- If they knock heads, implosion will suck all the air out of the room.
- If what you don’t know can’t hurt you, she’s practically invulnerable.
- If wit were shit, he’d be constipated.
- If you called him a wit, you’d be half right.
- If you give him a penny for his thoughts, you get change back.
- If you stand close enough to him, you can hear the ocean.
- Ignorant, and proud of it.
- Immune from any serious head injury.
- Immune to caffeine and all other stimulants.
- In a tub of Preparation H, he’d shrink down to thumb size.
- In his optimum environment, he’d be locked in a life and death struggle
with mushrooms. - In line for brains, thought they said pains, and said, “No, thanks”.
- In line for brains, thought they said were handing out milkshakes, and
he asked for “extra thick.” - In need of a ROM upgrade.
- In serious need of attitude adjustment.
- In the shopping mall of the mind, he’s in the toy store.
- In touch with her higher power, but out of touch with the rest of us.
- Includes a “thank you” note with her tax returns.
- Infinite space between her ears.
- Informationally deprived.
- Inhabits her own private timezone.
- Inspected by #13.
- Inspired the slogan, “A mind is a terrible thing to waste.”
- Intellectually/synaptically challenged.
- Invented a pencil with an eraser on each end.
- Invented a submarine with a screen door.
- IQ = dx / (1 + dx), where x = age.
- IQ lower than a snake’s belly in a wagon-rut.
- It’s hard to believe he beat 100,000 other sperm.
- Just another flash in the bedpan.
- Keeps his imagination on a long leash.
- Kept an open mind – and his brains fell out.
- Keywords: generalizations clue get
- Knitting with only one needle.
- Knows his sports, but his understanding is limited to violence.
- Landing with his gear/brain up and locked.
- Leaky sunroof.
- Left hand threaded.
- Left his booster on the launch pad.
- Left the store without all of his groceries.
- Leveled off before reaching altitude.
- Life by Norman Rockwell, but screenplay by Stephen King.
- Lightbulb over his head is burned out.
- Lights are on but nobody’s home.
- Lights not burning too bright.
- Like a barometer – vacuum at the top.
- Like a loose-leaf folder in winter.
- Like a one-armed man climbing a rope.
- Likes dunking for french fries.
- Little red choo-choo’s gone chugging 'round the bend / jumped the
track. - Lives in La-la-land.
- Lives in the same world, but a different universe.
- Living proof that nature does not abhor a vacuum.
- Long on dry wall, short on studs.
- Looking for a nickel in the corner of a circular room.
- Looks for the “Any” key.
- Looks just like Bill Gates.
- Loose chip on the microprocessor board.
- Loose wire to his headset/ringer.
- Lost his marbles.
- Low on thinking gas.
- Low-bandwidth as an information source.
- Lugnuts rattling in the hubcaps.
- Made a career out of mid-life crisis.
- Mainspring’s wound too tight.
- Makes a black hole look bright.
- Makes predictions that make weathermen/economists look good.
- Memorized every Dr. Seuss story written.
- Mental software is Version 1.0 / still in beta test.
- Mentally qualified for handicapped parking.
- Metronome needs oil.
- Might still be a virgin except for what nature did to her mind.
- Mind like a steel sieve.
- Mind like a steel trap – everything gets mangled / full of mice /
nothing in, nothing out / rusted shut. - Missed her last four scheduled tune-ups.
- Missing a few buttons on his remote control.
- Missing a few catalog cards / gears / marbles.
- Missing a layer of insulation in his attic.
- Monorail doesn’t go all the way to Tomorrowland.
- Mooring lines don’t reach the dock.
- More marbles in a spray-paint can than brains in his head.
- Mouth is in gear, brain is in neutral.
- Moves his lips to pretend he’s reading.
- Must have ignored a knock-down pitch.
- Nearly on a higher plane, but lost his boarding pass.
- Needs a checkup from the neck up.
- Needs another brain to make half-wit.
- Needs both hands to wipe his behind.
- Needs front end alignment.
- Needs his disk checked/reformatted.
- Needs his sleeves lengthened by a couple of feet so they can be tied in
the back. - Network constantly loses packets.
- Neurons are firing non-sequentially.
- Never finishes a thoug
- Never had a headcold in her life since diseases can’t exist in a
vacuum. - Never misses an episode of her screen-saver.
- Next-day delivery in a nanosecond world. – Van Jacobson
- Nice house but not much furniture / nobody lives there.
- Nine pence in the shilling.
- Nine rooms; no furniture.
- Nineteen cents short of a paradigm.
- No bubble in his gauge. (Refers to a submarine dive gauge.)
- No charge in her synapses.
- No coins in the old fountain.
- No filter in the coffeemaker.
- No grain in the silo.
- No hands on the rudder/yoke.
- No hay in the loft.
- No one at the throttle.
- No salt in his socks. (Land-lubber or green sailor.)
- No tar in his hemp. (Tar preserves a hemp (marijuana) line; this phrase
means one has been smoking his rope.) - No wind in her mind’s windmills.
- Not all his dogs are barking.
- Not an idiot, but plays one in his life.
- Not as dumb as he looks, but that would be impossible.
- Not digging in the same ditch with the rest of us.
- Not done evolving yet.
- Not enough brain cells for the Prozac to be effective.
- Not enough brains to get anywhere NEAR the gutter.
- Not enough change to break a dollar/pound/deutschmark/yen.
- Not enough sense to come in out of the rain.
- Not enough sense to stay out in the rain. (Like a 60’s flower child.)
- Not firing on all four/six/eight cylinders.
- Not firmly seated in the socket / screwed in tight.
- Not hard-docked.
- Not inflated to 90 PSI.
- Not Intel Inside. (Or, given Pentium problems, just: Intel inside.)
- Not much to show for four billion years of evolution.
- Not only rude, but ugly too.
- Not playing with / dealing from a full deck (-- not even in the game).
- Not running on full thrusters.
- Not shooting pool on a level table.
- Not the brightest bulb on the Christmas tree / light in the harbor.
- Not the full quid.
- Not the same since they took him off his medication.
- Not the sharpest knife in the drawer / tool in the shed / nail in the
box. - Not Turing equivalent.
- Not worth henshit on a pump handle.
- Not worth pissin’ on.
- Not wrapped too tight.
- Nothing between the stethoscopes.
- Nothing on her radar.
- Numb as a post / pounded thumb.
- Number 'n a hake. (New England expression; a notoriously stupid fish.)
- Nutty as a fruitcake.
- Off by one.
- Off his rocker/trolley.
- Oil doesn’t reach his dipstick.
- On permanent/unexcused leave of absence from his senses.
- On the batting end of a no-hitter.
- One bead short in her rosary.
- One bean short of chili.
- One beer short of a six-pack / a six-pack short of a case.
- One bird short of a flock.
- One bit short of a byte/word.
- One block short of a filesystem.
- One board short of a porch.
- One bomb/melon short of a full load.
- One boot stuck in the sand.
- One brick short of a wall/hod/load/pile.
- One bumper/rail short of a bank shot.
- One bun/donut short of a dozen.
- One car short of a chase scene.
- One card/marble short of a full deck.
- One chapter short of a novel.
- One chicken short of a henhouse.
- One chip short of a cookie.
- One chip short of a megabyte.
- One clearance short of landing/taking off.
- One clown short of a circus.
- One clue short of a solution.
- One cold solder joint.
- One color short of color-coordinated.
- One couplet short of a sonnet.
- One cup and saucer short of a place setting.
- One cylinder short of a full re-format.
- One diamond short of a ring.
- One dimension short of reality.
- One doughnut short of being a cop.
- One drool bib short of neat and tidy.
- One drop short of an empty bladder.
- One ear short of a bushel.
- One feather short of a whole duck.
- One fish short of a string.
- One flower short of an arrangement.
- One flying buttress short of a cathedral.
- One foot in the future, one foot in the past, pissing on the present.
- One french fry / hamburger short of a Happy Meal.
- One Froot Loop short of a full bowl.
- One fruit short of a basket.
- One gene short of a full chromosome.
- One goose short of a gaggle.
- One guppy short of an aquarium.
- One handle short of a suitcase.
- One hot pepper short of an enchilada.
- One inch short of a foot/yard.
- One inspection short of passing.
- One kernel short of an ear.
- One kopek short of a ruble.
- One link short of a chain.
- One live brain cell away from being a talking monkey.
- One measure short of a staff.
- One miracle short of being where he thinks he’s at.
- One miracle wouldn’t be enough to help him.
- One node short of a network.
- One nut short of a full pouch.
- One of the early failures of electroshock therapy.
- One open splice.
- One pancake short of a stack.
- One pane short of a window.
- One pea short of a pod/casserole.
- One pearl short of a necklace.
- One pickle short of a jar.
- One pie short of a holiday.
- One plane short of an Air Force / hangar.
- One point short of a polygon.
- One prayer short of absolution.
- One press short of a CAPS LOCK key. (Types all uppercase.)
- One punch/swing/hit short of a fight.
- One revision behind.
- One sandwich/apple/ant short of a picnic.
- One saucer short of a tea-service.
- One scallop short of a seafood platter.
- One screw loose.
- One sentence short of a paragraph.
- One shade short of a rainbow.
- One sheep short of a sweater.
- One shingle short of a roof, and the water’s getting in.
- One ship short of a full fleet.
- One shot short of a chain. (Shot is a section of anchor chain.)
- One shot short of a locker. (Shot is ammunition; a locker is where it’s
stored.) - One shrimp short of a barbie.
- One side short of a pentagon.
- One signature short of a book.
- One slate short of a full roof.
- One sleeve/button short of a shirt.
- One snowflake short of a ski slope.
(to be continued)…
