I don't have the heart for it: not wanting to do things - About Words - Cambridge Dictionary blog
Expand your English vocabulary with these colourful phrases to talk about not wanting to do things and why.| About Words - Cambridge Dictionary blog
USA, 1913—to produce, bet or pay out money to support one’s statements or opinions; to do something that demonstrates one’s assertion| word histories
USA, 1950, as ‘shopping-bag stuffer’—an advertising leaflet or similar piece of promotional material handed out to shoppers or placed in shopping bags alongside goods purchased| word histories
Australia, 1890: an analysis of the state of the weather at sea—UK, 1926: the BBC-radio broadcast of weather reports and forecasts for the seas around the British Isles| word histories
slang, disparaging: a person of small stature—from 1677 onwards in bilingual dictionaries (English-French and French-English) by Guy Miege| word histories
Expand your English vocabulary with these colourful phrases to talk about not wanting to do things and why.| About Words - Cambridge Dictionary blog
In the deep South of the United States, when sunlight breaks through a gentle rain, you might hear someone say, “The devil’s beating his wife.” It’s a phrase that stops many outsiders in thei…| Atkins Bookshelf
UK, 1951—‘mother-in-law’s chair’, ‘mother-in-law’s cushion’ and ‘mother-in-law’s seat’ are colloquial appellations for the globular spiny cactus Echinocactus grusonii, native to Mexico…| word histories
an uncovered extra seat at the back or on the side of a two-seater motor car—USA, 1907| word histories
USA, 1874—a joke made at the expense of the joke-teller’s (real or fictitious) mother-in-law; this type of joke considered (especially depreciatively) as a genre| word histories
England; also: the British Parliament—UK, 1857—popularised in 1865 by the British politician John Bright| word histories
a charwoman, a cleaning lady—UK, 1940—popularised in 1942 by the charwoman’s name in the BBC radio comedy series ‘It’s That Man Again’| word histories
conventionally middle-class—UK, 1953—from ‘Mrs Dale’, the name of a conventional middle-class woman in Mrs Dale’s Diary, a BBC radio serial broadcast from 1948 to 1969| word histories
I currently have three quotes on the wall in my study at the church building. I suspect that this will change with time, but each phrase is a reminder to me and I hope will shape my ministry over t…| nuakh
crowded or confined tightly together—Britain, 1706—in early use, this phrase often referred to the transatlantic slave trade| word histories
said of a great number of persons or things, especially when pressed against one another—UK, 1776—refers to herrings in a barrel| word histories
a container used to store for posterity a selection of objects thought to be representative of a particular moment in time—USA, 1938—coined to specifically designate the container built by the West…| word histories
UK, 1931—sports (originally golf): a style of play characterised by an emphasis on luck rather than skill—the image is of a golfer who trusts to luck when hitting the ball| word histories
three daily meals plus a bed for the night (i.e., basic food and shelter)—USA, 1929—chiefly used in relation to the military, prison, and shelters for homeless people—‘hot’ designates a hot meal…| word histories
very boring or unexciting—‘(as) dull as ditchwater’ (1770)—the later phrase ‘(as) dull as dishwater’ (1832) is probably due to mispronunciation of ‘ditchwater’ in the original phrase…| word histories
This is really cool. I never thought we’d get an answer to this one. My friend Rich Fisher at the Vickers Machine Gun Collection & Research Society posted a video on the old chestnut that “the whole nine yards” refers to the length of machine gun belts. As he shows for the Vickers and I’ve … Continue reading An Answer for “The Whole Nine Yards”→| The BS Historian
