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Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
Joined: Mar 2002
Posts: 1,692 |
Does anyone have favourite similes, metaphors or other comparisons? At Primary School we had an excellent teacher of English, Miss Googe – as remarked on an earlier thread, the names of good teachers stay with you. She introduced us to some basic rhetoric, though we didn’t know it was that, and I still recall being charmed at the thought of “a line of pylons striding up the hillside”.
This simile from Terry Pratchett struck me as original:
“…as self-centred as a gyroscope…”
A cleverly turned phrase, if you’ll forgive the pun. Has it been used before I wonder?
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Posts: 5,400
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Oct 2000
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learned from my mother, old as the hills i am sure, but i still like it:
As crooked as a ram's horn!
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Posts: 6,511
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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From my mother:
As nervous as a long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs.
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Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 11,613
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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From my aunt, when I was late arriving for a meal: we waited for you like one pig waits for another.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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One gleaned from the pages of Pogo allus struck my fancy:
Prouder'n a pig with a purple pocklebook.
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member
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One from my Tennessee Granny, commenting on our clumsy approach to accomplishing a household chore:
"You boys are going after that like you're killing snakes."
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Posts: 7,210
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jun 2002
Posts: 7,210 |
one of my Dad's favorites:
"better than a kick in the pants"
hmm. "in" the pants, as opposed to "on". hafta think about that one.
formerly known as etaoin...
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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"better than a kick in the pants"
Which brings to mind:
Beats a poke in the eye with a sharp stick.
And who can forget:
Mallem in aquis vivere,
Nudo semper sub aere,
Quam in hoc mergi pipere
?
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Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
Joined: Mar 2002
Posts: 1,692 |
Well, that's swans for you ... I wonder what roast swan tastes like anyway. Ever tried it?
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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what roast swan tastes like
Neither with nor without pepper sauce.
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old hand
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old hand
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Faintly smelling YART in the air:
"all the chances of a snowflake in hell"
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Posts: 7,210 |
what roast swan tastes like anyway
ouch!
formerly known as etaoin...
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member
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member
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From my husband: Sharp as a marble.
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old hand
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old hand
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My Mum/Mom says "better than a kick in the teeth", which is what I also use now. [turning into my mother -e]
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old hand
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old hand
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>"all the chances of a snowflake in hell"
Or, my favourite, Douglas Adams' version - "a whelk's chance in a supernova"
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Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
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"Going like a cut cat" ...
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Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
Joined: Aug 2002
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My mothers "more roses (or whatever) than you can shake a stick at" and "six of one, half a dozen of the other" for it doesn't matter which.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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A couple I like so well, I snicked them from G.I. Gurdjieff "Everything is just roses, roses." "If you go on a spree then go the whole hog, including the postage." Beelzebub's Tales to His Grandson, a trilogy written by G.I. Gurdjieff is a very interesting trip if anyone is wondering what to read this summer. I think he might have kissed the Blarney Stone at some point in his life 
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member
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To express alacrity in preying on someone, verbally or physically: "He was on that boy like white on rice."
To express a large quantity: "They have more [insert commodity here] than Carter's has pills."
The latter expression hails from the southern side of the Mason-Dixon Line, I think. It's a reference to a now defunct product known as Carter's Little Liver Pills, still on the market when I moved to Atlanta in 1963 but not much later than that.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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I knew the Carter's comparison *as "than Carter's has little liver pills." This from a Wisconsin farm girl mother or an urban northern father. It was a few years earlier than 1963.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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I've been puzzled by this one. Anyone know the origin?
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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"He was on it like white on rice." Somewhat similar to "He was on it like a goose on a June bug."
The former means he was completely on the job, the idea being that rice is already white, so it's completely covered. The latter just means quickly.
TEd
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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What do y'all think "He'll be all over you like a cheap suit" means?
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journeyman
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journeyman
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What do y'all think "He'll be all over you like a cheap suit" means?
Well... a cheap suit would be one that isn't made very well, or doesn't fit you perfectly so it would slide all over you instead of hanging perfectly or fitting snugly. (???)
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enthusiast
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enthusiast
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One I'm getting tired of hearing: "...like herding cats." Seems to be quite popular with Washington folk these days. Right up there with "the whole nine yards."
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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old hand
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old hand
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herd cats - we have it with fleas..
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Herding fleas is easy. Just get you a cat.
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old hand
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old hand
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I was trying to herd a single cat this morning, and failed utterly. She has a blanky* she usually lies on. Then I get the other two couch cushions to myself. However, today she refused to use the blanky. Nope. Took over the middle couch cushion. Nine-pound cat prevented any human from usefully using the couch! I moved her. She perched on the edge of the couch, and the edge of the blanky, and refused to get on the blanky. Hissed at me for trying to suggest she move over a little! So there we stayed for the better part of the morning, I on the rest of the couch, cat perched uncomfortably on the edge.
* How the heck do you spell blanky? Blankey? Blankie? As in, small blanket? It all starts to look like gibberish after a while.
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member
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Bean - go with blanky, I think.
My favourite - also from my mum (not valued enough as a repository of wisdom, I think!): s/he's not as green as s/he is cabbage looking...
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Posts: 2,636 |
I like blankie.
Googleizing gets this:
blankie-34,400
blanky-10,400
blankey-18,700
All three show references to small blankets on the first page of each search, but blankie shows more.
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Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
Joined: Mar 2002
Posts: 1,692 |
Alexis, I haven't heard that one for years and years and years and ....!
Bean, how about 'blankette' or even 'blanquette', shhh...don't want to start a food thread!
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addict
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addict
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I love 'like piffy on a rock bun', though I always thought it was a Cornish expression. Quinion has this to say http://www.quinion.com/words/qa/qa-pif1.htm
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Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
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Piffy, I like piffy on a rock bun - no-one will know what I mean.
When a joke or idea doesn't work I use my mom's "that went over like a lead balloon"
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member
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One I just heard yesterday from an expatriate Brit:
"Like chalk and cheese." From the context, this corresponds to the US expression "Apples and oranges," when making a point about comparing two things that aren't comparable.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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I like it better than apples and oranges. Apples and oranges *are comparable.
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old hand
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old hand
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Just fwiw, I have never heard the expression "comparing chalk and cheese", used in the way I have heard "comparing apples and oranges." The most common use of C&C up here in Zild is in comparing people - "those two are like chalk and cheese". The meaning is closer to "oil and water", or at least conveys an odd pairing. No doubt Pfranz will correct me, but we do the use the phrases "comparing apples with apples" and "apples with oranges" for use hen describing comparisons of things. To my ear, the Zild use of C&C has more to with compatibility than comparability. Just my $0.02
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Hmm. I would have said like chalk and cheese meant incompatible rather than incomparable. Usually said of people who you just know are going to disagree with each other and have endless rows.
Bingley
Bingley
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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I wasn't chopped-livering you, honest, sjm. You slipped in while I was writing.
Bingley
Bingley
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old hand
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old hand
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Bingley, don't worry. You may be able to spit on it from where you are, but you're still South of the Equator, and Upworlders have to stick together.
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