Always interesting when life rears up and shows you where idiomatic expressions come from.
Among others, previously learned: “Not playing with a full deck,” and “One oar in the water.” Currently learning the hard way: “lousy” and “nitpicker”. What’s your favorite?
Exploring strange new worlds with Captain Kirk.
A few nuggets short of a happymeal.
A tinny short of a sixpack (Aussie expression)
A few bubbles off a plum (not sure if that’s even the right spelling of “plum” in this case)
Actually, what I meant was any interesting expression, that sort of makes you go “aha” when you realize its origin or literal meaning… although, expressions for dumb, okay, that’s good too. One of my favorites is “a few clowns short of a circus”.
Statia — I think it’s “plumb” in that case, and no “a”. ["a few bubbles off plumb"]
["plumb" is... err... the vertical equivalent
to "level".]
For “aha” factor — “off tack”. I had no idea it had anything to do with sailing…
I like “bought the farm” and “hat trick”.
What does “hat trick” mean and where does it come from?
A “hat trick” in current use is when a hockey player scores three goals in a game and the fans litter the ice with hats. Sometimes people will use it for any time someone does something three times in a row, too. I didn’t realize that it came from the sport of cricket – where if a bowler got three wickets by three straight balls (whatever that means) his club gave him a new hat!
I read this on the Internet, so it must be true.
I see. That’s an expression I’ve read a lot, both in the sports section and elsewhere, without ever having a clue what it meant. And just this morning I was reading a sports article on a big cricket match and thinking about coding one of those forms where a person fills in blanks with random words, hits “publish” and it results in an article about a big game in some imaginary sport.
Because, you know, cricket, man, what the hell?
Someone want to explain the rules of cricket?
I think the last person that tried to explain the rules of cricket wound up insane and got himself installed as the president of Iraq. Or something.
You mean, this isn’t about *oil*, it*s about *cricket*?