If language gets you chuffed to goolies, you probably have a favourite expression that makes you feel as boffo as the grand panjandrum.
So what slang expressions do you love?
Nichevo? I’m not trying to sell coal to Newcastle here. Just trying to grease the gander.
Not expressions, exactly, but I’ve become fond of the words “huzzah” and “gadzooks!”.
For expressions I like “Don’t bring me a dead cat without also bringing a shovel”.
mmm
“As jy dom is, moet jy kak.”
I do a lot of mock-cussing, and two I like a lot are “Son of a Badger” and “Chert!” My sister, professionally, says “Fiddle-dee-dee.”
A friend used to say, “Slick as snail snot.”
Another friend once condemned a jerk for being an “Intermediate Vector Bozo.” (Pun on Intermediate Vector Boson.)
I don’t know what that means. Maybe (from Quebec French) your eyes are in the fat of the beans?
No, it’s Afrikaans. Literal translation :
If you’re dumb, you have to shit (yourself)
Metaphorically, it means to suffer the consequences of your own stupidity - An English equivalent would be “play stupid games, win stupid prizes”.
You must be able to charm the very birds from the trees with such poetic musings.
It loses a lot in translation, believe me.
When I find something serendipitously I say “snakes’ hips.”
“there’s a rabbit off”
Same meaning as “something is fishy” but I’ve only ever heard it used by people from my home area in the north-east of England.
You know those bumps they put in parking lots to make people slow down? My parents always called them “sleeping policemen”. None of my schoolmates ever seemed to know the term. I don’t know if it was a regional thing, or a generational thing.
It’s a Britishism, AFAIK. Do you only have them in parking lots? We have them in roads as well.
Spent a year abroad in England when I was in college, these were my favorites.
“Minging for England” - ‘minging’ is a verb meaning to actively be ugly. For England means the persons ability qualifies them past the profesional level, they have qualified to represent the nation on the world stage.
“That’s not Cricket” - meaning ‘that’s not fair’. Cricket is a gentleman’s game and all players are expected to behave as such. Even if they aren’t called out a player will walk off if they think they were really out.
‘Well chuffed’ and ‘cheeky’ don’t really have American equivalents so I like them for that reason, though I can’t use them then. ‘Excited’ and ‘childish smartass’ are the closest I can think of, but not quite the same. You know it when you see it.
“Harmless,” meaning insignificant, of no consequence. Jersey City c. 1970.
“I’m gonna tell them how the cow ate the cabbage” to mean “I’m going to tell the the unvarnished truth”. It doesn’t seem to matter what continent the co-worker I’m saying this to is located on, if they understand English, they seem to understand the meaning without further explanation.
Similarly, “People in Hell want iced water”.
I garnered both expressions from my mother, and find them both valuable.
From my dad, “Fine as frog hair.” Which I’ve only heard from one other person who was from Oklahoma, not Ohio and 20 years younger.
The usual response? Frogs don’t have hair. You don’t see it because it’s so fine.
Something that doesn’t translate well: “They will Amelia Bedelia it.” If you ever read the Amelia Bedelia books, then you know what I mean. If you never had, here’s an article from Mental Floss.
Heh, my dad, an immigrant Texan after rolling from Colorado to the Philippines and California to all over the midwest until he finally landed here (seriously, I was born here, and he thought the place more special than I do) would have probably replied “Fine as frog hair, split four ways” if you asked how he was doing. I can’t bring myself to actually say that to anyone, though.
Oh, and another from my mother that I think more often than I actually say in any work environment is “Well, shit fire and save matches!” If you had that phrase said to you 1/10th of the times I had by my mom, it’d be burned into your brain, too.
Yeesh. I’m familiar with quite a few of these already referenced.
Speaking of badgers, I always loved the charming “growling at the badger” to reference a particular sexual act that women generally enjoy.
My late Kiwi-Aussie husband once remarked, “I wouldn’t want her to fart in my last pound of flour,” as a largish lady passed us by. Shameful. But funny.
If someone asks my advice as I am assisting them with a project, I will probably respond, “You’re humping this goat. I’m just holding the horns.”
I guess my favored colloquialisms run to rude and bawdy. Don’t judge me.
My version is “slicker’n snake shit.”
I used to hear that when I lived in New Zealand. Here in Panama they call them “policias muertos,” or “dead policemen,” a little more morbid.