Does anyone know the Spanish one along the lines of ’ like trying to figure out the sex of angels’ to describe a completely pointless, academic exercise?
So, was the flogging against the original person done away with? Or would we now have two floggings?
Marienee I love those ! Especially the ant-fucker. Heh.
Cooked enough for threshers means having a huge amount of food. It comes from the days when a grain harvest was done by hand, and all your neighbors would come to help. At dinnertime, the threshers would have worked up quite an appetite.
Like ducks on a Junebug. Free range ducks, besides eating the grain you feed them, will eat all the bugs in the farmyard. A Junebug beetle is a big morsel, and it might have several ducks fighting over it.
So, it refers to players jumping on a football, or young women after a suitor.
On him like a cheap suit (relentless nagging) usually refers to a father nagging a son to get some chore done, or to get a job and get a place of his own.
That could also be “on him like white on rice”.
Hands down, my favorite is in Chinese, lan yu chong shu.
Roughly speaking, it refers to an emperor who loved music from large orchestras. However, there weren’t enough talented musicians to fill up the orchestra for the emperor, so some guys would pretend to play, while others actually made the beautiful music.
So basically it is somewhat derogatory saying about someone trying to pass themselves off as an expert. But the reason I liked it was that when I lived in China, and someone would complement my Chinese, I would bust this out (as in, I’m the guy who isn’t really playing his instrument). It never failed to get a laugh.
“like Sherman through Georgia” - a thing is done quickly and destructively. (refers to Sherman’s March to the Sea in the Civil War)
Yiddish has lots of great sayings.
“Hockin a chainik” - Banging on your teakettle
– complaining about things to get attention.
He/She doesn’t know whether to shit or go blind
– person is so excited they don’t know what to do with themselves. (I’ve heard this only in English, but its a translation of a Yiddish saying)
Not according to the Word Detective
who says:
He does go on to say that there is some doubt about this though:
My family uses dozens and dozens of idioms, and when I moved away I often found myself having to explain or repeat something.
“Six of one,” for “it doesn’t matter to me.” This is shorthand for “Six of one, half-dozen of another,” e.g., the same thing.
To “drop it like a bad habit” or “drop it like a hot poker” is obviously to stop doing something or drop a subject quickly.
If someone is “nervous as a whore” or “nervous as a whore in church,” they are, politely saying, out of their element.
One might say “Katie bar the door” to prepare for trouble or an onslaught of work.
And of course if you are fleeing in a hurry from someplace you might say that you “ran like your ass was on fire” or “ran like the devil.”
Things that are particularly ugly would be, of course, “ugly as sin.”
If you went a very long distance, you went “all over hell’s half acre” or “all over God’s green earth.” If you have a lot of something you have it “up one side and down the other” or “up the yazoo” or “coming out of your ears.”
I have dozens. I keep forgetting.
If someone hit you particularly hard, he “cleaned your clock.” If you were upset, you were “angry enough to spit nails.” If you were very VERY upset, you were “angry enough to reload.” You may have offered to slap someone “six ways to Sunday” or “into next week” or “so hard your children will be born dizzy.” You might even malign his character, telling him he was “lazier than a bump on a log” or “so stupid he couldn’t pour piss out of a boot with instructions on the heel” or “couldn’t find his ass with a map and a compass.” You might even strike him back although you “couldn’t fight your way out of a wet paper bag.” This would be particularly stupid, proving you “don’t know shit from Shinola.” If you fled at this point, that would be an excellent decision, because your assailant would probably be encouraging you to “take a long hike off a short pier.” By fleeing, you will be “in like Flynn,” unless you were so badly beaten that you had “more ills than Carter had pills,” (that is, had many reasons to complain).
Useless as tits on a boar.
Rode hard and put up wet
Usually used to describe someone who looks thoroughly debauched and/or prematurely aged. Keith Richards would be an excellent example.
I love you.
I think that my work PC has new wallpaper!
“Suckin’ on the hind tit.” If you look at the teats of animals that bear multiple young you will notice that the ones closer to the back legs and tail and away from the chest are bigger and fatter than the ones on the chest. This term means living well.
In the same vein “livin’ high off the hog” means eating the best cuts of meat and living well.
“High, low, three jacks and the game” means having a big win. The expression comes from the card game, Pitch, which scores using these terms. Pitch is a card game played by rural folk is the US.
Spanish one. Short, common version: más feo que pegarle a tu padre con un calcetín sudado “uglier than hittin your Pa with a sweaty sock.” Long, my family version: más feo que pegarle a tu padre con un calcetín sudado que lleve medio ladrillo dentro y luego pedirle la paga “uglier than hitting your Pa with a half-brick-filled sweaty sock and then asking for your Sunday money.” Normally used to refer to behaviors, not faces.
Spanish one. No mezcles el tocino con la velocidad, “don’t mix bacon and speed,” also used as eso es mezclar el tocino con la velocidad, “that’s like mixing bacon and speed.” It’s about non-sequiturs and interruptions that have nothing to do with the matter previously at hand. Mind you, tocino also means pig, and anybody who thinks pig and speed aren’t related has never tried to grab a greased pig! (we used to do that in my high school’s feastday, back before it became cruelty to animals).
When someone just stands there when you ask them to do something: “What, are those ears painted on?”
Q. Hey, where are my shoes?
A. Up my arse hanging on a nail.
Ah, yes! Southern American English is rich in idioms!
Busier than a: One armed paperhanger (referring to wallpaper, of course) or a one-legged man at an asskicking contest.
Ugly: “Looks like seven miles of bad road,” or “Uglier than a mud fence daubed with lizards.”
Confused: “Don’t know whether to scratch my watch or wind my ass.”
Happy: “Happier than a dead pig in the sunshine.” I don’t know the origins of this one. Maybe some sort of rictus that makes a dead pig look like it’s grinning?
“Lower than a snake’s belly,” describes someone mean or underhanded.
If someone is odd or not very smart, s/he might be described as “two bubbles off plumb.”
Smart: “Uses his head for something besides a hatrack,” or “Uses her head for something besides growing hair.” (In my family, we often say “Uses his head for something besides a coathanger,” but that’s because a former employee of my grandparents’ used to mix her metaphors all the time. This was one of her most commonly used malapropisms.)