Phrases which make no sense

[WhereTheFuck]

It has just occurred to me that the phrase 'one in one out' (like when you go to a club and it's really busy) doesn't make sense. It should be 'one out one in' because you don't get to go in until someone comes out.
For some reason this is now really annoying me! Does anyone else have examples of everyday phrases that actually make no sense when you think about them?

I dislike it when people start with "I'm sorry but ....". They're not sorry so it's just a pointless way to preface their point of view.

@CrumbleLady

My uncle used to always say "well, I'll go the foot of our stairs" when he was surprised by something.

I never understood that one!

Is to let the people know upstairs too as it's such surprising news?

Eat your heart out. What does that MEAN

You can't have your cake and eat it too. What on earth else should one do with cake?

Sleeping with someone. It's what you're doing while you're awake, not asleep surely.

@JustJustWhy

You can't have your cake and eat it too. What on earth else should one do with cake?

The point is that once you've eaten it, you don't have it any more.

Six of one and half a dozen of the other means that you are comparing two things that are essentially the same. E.g. "If I drive to [place] on the B road rather than using the motorway, it's a shorter distance but will take me just as long to get there. It's six of one and half a dozen of the other."

(Obviously half a dozen is 6, which is why the saying works. I just realised I'd assumed that everyone knows that a dozen = 12, but maybe they don't?)

The saying "It's 6 or two 3s" works on exactly the same basis, and there are other permutations too.

DH hates when people say money is the root of all evil, because it's an incomplete phrase so it makes less sense. Same with people saying "the proof is in the pudding" which drives him INSANE, because it isn't, it's in the eating. If anyone says it I can always see the vein in his forehead twitching

Lots of people at my company "triangulate" things even when there's not three of them.

@Chunkymenrock

Everyone being 'obsessed by.' An obsession is a psychological disorder. Whatever happened to really liking something or being extremely fond of it?

Your 3 year old is not obsessed by cats. They just really like them.

No, it's to be preoccupied by or haunted by a fixed idea. The way we use it now is a metaphorical expression of the root, which is similar to 'besiege', and the meaning has evolved over 500 years or so. It's not a word that only belongs to clinical description.

@StorminaBcup

Same difference. It’s either the same or different surely?

And this might be a local one but ‘can you borrow me…’, it really winds me up, do you mean ‘can I borrow….’.

Borrow originally meant lend and some dialects retain the earlier meaning. It's your dialect that got it 'wrong' at some point.

www.etymonline.com/word/borrow

'The exception that proves the rule' doesn't make sense to me. And, everyone's favourite, 'it is what it is' is utterly redundant, meaningless and hackneyed.

I don't understand "Aren't I?"

It's not "Are I not?" but "Am I not".

@careerchangeperhaps

When we talk about an alarm or timer 'going off' when it's actually coming ON. It was my 3 year old that told me it made no sense!

But when you set a timer it’s “on” as it is counting down the time. When it goes “off” ie the time’s up, you’re alerted to it by the sound.

She’s no better than she ought to be, is not only suggesting that someone has come from a “bad” background, but also that they have worked to improve themselves/social standing.

"If I'm being honest..."
Why, are you a habitual liar?

"Let me be very clear"
Why, is obfuscation the order of the day?
m.youtube.com/watch?v=MeDcqvFz3l4

Sorry, wrong link. Meant this one:
www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/conservative/9592548/Conservative-Conference-sketch-David-Cameron-cleared-for-take-off.html

Gah…

• also that they haven’t worked to improve themselves/their social standing.

Nat West's 'We are what we do' never fails to annoy. But that might be the way it is spoken.

You can't have your cake and eat it too. What on earth else should one do with cake?

Thank you!

The point is that once you've eaten it, you don't have it any more.
Yes but the saying used to be "You can't eat your cake and have it too". That's what makes sense and I take to mean what you've written. Why/When it got switched to the other, I don't know. The other just doesn't sound right.

I don't think "swings and roundabouts" means exactly the same as "six of one and half a dozen of the other" — the second means two things are the same, whereas the first is usually if you've lost out on one thing it's been made up by the other. ("How were sales for the concert compared with last year?" "We didn't pre-sell as many tickets this year, but lots of people bought on the door, so it's swings and roundabouts really.")

@Thecurtainsofdestiny

I don't understand "Aren't I?"

It's not "Are I not?" but "Am I not".

'Amn't I?'

Isn't swings and roundabout basically what you make on the swings you lose on the roundabouts, so kind of same same?

@AdaColeman

Break a leg this illustrates theatrical suspicion, that you shouldn’t wish a performer “good luck” before a performance in case that brings them the opposite “bad luck”. So, you wish them bad luck “break a leg”, in the hope they will have the opposite and give a star performance!

Is there also a connection between being in the cast of the performance and A cast if you “break a leg”?

My ds thought that when he threw a ball he was catching it, because whenever I throw a ball to him I say "catch"! So he would throw something and say "mummy I catched it" (when he was about 3!)