‘Spam medal’: meaning and origin
military slang, 1944—a medal awarded to all members of a force—especially the 1939-1945 Star, awarded to British service personnel who took part in WWII—refers to the ubiquitousness of Spam as a foodstuff
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‘a spare tyre around the waistline’: meaning and origin
USA, 1929—UK, 1933—in the phrase ‘a spare tyre around the waistline’, and its variants, the noun ‘spare tyre’ denotes a roll of fat
Read More‘Red Sea pedestrian’: meaning and origin
UK, 1912—humorous: a Jewish person—refers to the Crossing of the Red Sea, as recounted in the Book of Exodus—coined on various occasions by different persons, independently from each other
Read More‘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‘Irishman’s rise’: meaning and origin
UK, 1847—a fall in value, especially a reduction in wages—one of several expressions denoting the opposite in meaning of the noun qualified by the genitive case of ‘Irishman’—for example: ‘Irishman’s promotion’ (a demotion) and ‘Irishman’s hurricane’ (nautical: a flat calm)
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‘well, I’ll go to the foot of our stairs’: meaning and early occurrences
UK (Midlands), 1939—exclamative phrase used to express astonishment or incredulity—the reason that this metaphor was chosen is unknown
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