‘a sandwich short of a picnic’ and other phrases meaning ‘stupid’ or ‘crazy’
With words denoting some specified deficiency in a desirable or standard quantity of something, ‘short of a ——’ means ‘mentally deficient’, ‘slightly crazy’.
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‘to know one’s onions’ – ‘c’est mes oignons’
US, 1898: ‘to know one’s onion’ (in the singular), to be very knowledgeable about something — French, 1897: ‘c’est mes oignons’, it’s my own business
Read Moremeaning and origin of ‘eager beaver’
1942—In US Air Force’s slang, ‘eager beaver’ denoted an alert and efficient student cadet, with allusion to the animal’s industriousness.
Read Moremeaning and origin of ‘to pull one’s socks up’
probably British English, 1880s—to make an effort to improve or reform, ‘to pull oneself together’—based on the image of sprucing oneself up
Read Moreorigin of the word ‘skinflint’
attested 1699—from the hyperbolical phrase ‘to skin a flint’ (1656)—cf. ‘to skin a flea for its hide and tallow’ and French ‘tondre un œuf’ (‘to shave an egg’)
Read Morethe biblical name ‘Moab’ in public-school slang
In Psalms, the subjugated nation of Moab is compared to a vessel used for washing the feet—hence in school slang ‘Moab’: humorous for ‘washroom’, ‘tub’, ‘sink’
Read MoreEating in the Romance languages
In Latin, short words having complicated irregularities in their forms gave way to simpler words with regular patterns and longer phonetic individualities.
Read Morethe various meanings of ‘to fly a kite’
to get credit or money by using a fraudulent financial instrument; to send an illicit or secret note; to find out in what direction affairs are tending
Read Moremeaning and origin of ‘shiver my timbers’
British, 18th century—a mock oath attributed to sailors, meaning ‘may my ship’s beams be broken into pieces’—early variants used by Tobias Smollett
Read Moremeanings and origin of the phrase ‘kingdom come’
‘the next world’, hence also ‘death’, ‘utter destruction’—1752—a loose, originally slangy, use of the petition ‘Thy kingdom come’ in the ‘Lord’s Prayer’
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