‘bimbette’: meaning and origin
USA, 1978—a young woman or teenage girl who is regarded as sexually attractive, but unintelligent or frivolous—from ‘bimbo’ and the suffix ‘-ette’
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‘Vatican roulette’: meaning and origin
USA, 1957—the rhythm method of birth control, as permitted by the Roman Catholic Church—with allusion to the unpredictable efficacy of this contraceptive method: from ‘Vatican’, denoting the authority of the Roman Catholic Church, and ‘Russian roulette’
Read More‘short-arm inspection’: meaning and origin
USA, 1917—originally and chiefly military slang—an inspection of the penis for venereal disease or other infection—the image is of the penis as an additional, but shorter, limb
Read More‘unshirted hell’: meaning and origin
‘serious trouble’—USA, 1866—from the image of taking off one’s shirt before getting into a fight, and from ‘hell’ in the sense of ‘a severe reprimand’, as in ‘to give someone hell’
Read More‘caught in the headlights’: meanings and origin
used of a person who is frozen with fright or surprise, or is trying to flee, as a result of suddenly becoming the focus of attention—alludes to the habit of deer and rabbits of stopping still when dazzled by the headlights of a motor vehicle, or of running away within the headlight beam
Read More‘like the back (end) of a bus’: meaning and origin
UK, 1934—used of a person regarded as physically unattractive or sexually undesirable
Read More‘femiphobia’ & ‘feminophobia’: meaning and origin
‘femiphobia’ (USA) 1907—‘feminophobia’ (UK) 1914—an irrational fear or dislike of women—from Latin ‘fēmina’ (woman) and combining form ‘-phobia’—probably each coined on various occasions by different persons, independently from each other
Read More‘croque-madame’: meanings and origin
1932—coined after ‘croque-monsieur’—a toasted or fried sandwich filled with ham and cheese and topped with a poached or fried egg—but originally denoted any of various types of toasted or fried sandwich
Read More‘five o’clock shadow’: meaning and origin
the beard growth which becomes visible in the late afternoon on the face of a man who has shaved earlier in the day—originally (USA, 1937) the catchline of an advertising campaign for Gem Micromatic Razor and Blades
Read More‘coronation chicken’: meanings and origin
a dish of cold cooked chicken served in a mild creamy curry sauce—so named because created for a lunch held to mark the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II in June 1953, at which it was called ‘Poulet Reine Elizabeth’—also USA, April 1953: a dish created when the Poultry and Egg National Board organised Coronation Chicken Day
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