‘to come up with the rations’: meaning and origin
military slang, derisive—of military medals and decorations: to be awarded automatically, without regard to merit—coined during the First World War
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‘to sell sand in the Sahara’: meaning and origin
USA, 1907—refers to the supply of something to a place where it is not needed—in particular, ‘could sell sand in the Sahara’ is applied to an efficient salesman, and, by extension, to a persuasive person
Read More‘to sell refrigerators to the Eskimos’: meaning and origin
USA, 1904—refers to the supply of something to a place where it is not needed—in particular, ‘could sell refrigerators to the Eskimos’ is applied to an efficient salesman, and, by extension, to a persuasive person
Read More‘wogs begin at Calais’: meaning and origin
1947—is used to express an attitude of insularity and hostility to foreigners attributed to the British—a shortening of ‘golliwog’, the derogatory and offensive noun ‘wog’ designates a non-white person
Read More‘if it’s Tuesday, this must be Belgium’: meaning and origin
title of a CBS television documentary first broadcast in 1966—came to be used derogatorily of any fast package-tour—gave rise to the pattern ‘(if) it’s Tuesday, this (or it) must be ——’, used of travel anywhere
Read More‘singing milkshake’: meaning and origin
1979—nickname given, in particular, to singer Olivia Newton-John—alludes to the type of popular music that (like a milkshake) is discarded as soon as it has been consumed
Read More‘where the rubber meets the road’: meanings and origin
USA, 1956—where the important facts or realities lie; where theory is put into practice—originated in the jargon of the advertising business, in which ‘let’s get down (to) where the rubber meets the road’ meant ‘how much is it going to cost?’
Read MoreBritish and Irish uses of ‘more front than’
denotes effrontery—‘front’ denotes self-assurance, but the word that follows ‘than’ puns on ‘front’ in the sense of the façade of a building, a long seafront, etc.—also denotes a well-endowed woman, with reference to ‘front’ in the sense of a woman’s bust
Read Moremeaning and origin of ‘nothingburger’ and of ‘mouseburger’
‘nothingburger’: a person or thing of no importance, value or substance—‘mouseburger’: a young woman of unexceptional appearance and talents, regarded as timid, dowdy or mousy—from the use of ‘burger’ as the second element in compounds denoting types of hamburger
Read More‘in more trouble than Speed Gordon’: meaning and origin
Australia, 1938—beset with extraordinary difficulties—refers to Speed Gordon, the Australian name of Flash Gordon, the hero of the eponymous space-opera comic strip first published in 1934
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