The thing's people say(what do they all mean)

[happycat]

Got me thinking in the last week all the things that people say Where does it all come from
1.sick as a parrot
2.pot calling the kettle black
3.cutting your nose off dispite your face
4.looking like a dogs dinner
5.(new saying)That's the dog's bks
Doe's anyone ever know the real meaning's of these sayings I even say some of these things and I have no idea why Anyone know?

Mind you can't see the dogs b***ks on catch phrase.

I think cutting your nose to to spite your face, is something like :-

You really want to go somewhere and have a row with DH and you say Right because you did that I will not come to it with you, when you really wanted to go in the first place.

I am sure someone could of said it in a few words, but my moto is why use 5 words when 50 will do nicely

Not sure where they came from though.

yes,you english people say some funny things

My all time fave though is :-

Stone the spaniards

This site might help you happycat:

The Phrase Finder

butterfly

breeze

PS Happycat, your number 5 phrase is in the finder too!

Excellent Butterfly there were ones on there I've never heard off.

Yes I was supprised too see number 5on there

watched the thing with niel Morisey in last night and there again was another one 'stitched up like a kipper' can't find that one on the site.We all say it a the correct times but where did it come from? When you listen out for it there are loads of phrase's everyday and we don't often stop to think about it.

I don't know that "stitched up like a kipper" one!

My Mum has some truly weird ones "stood like piffy on a rock bun", "well, I'll go to the foot of our stairs" and (my personal favourite) "layers for meddlers and crutches for lame ducks".

Mmmm....

The foot of our stairs one is on the Phrase Finder (exclamation of surprise, originating in North of England) but not the other two.

Thanks for link, butterflymum.

1. Pot calling the kettle black - relates to when pots and kettles were heated over open fires, and the outside was black with ash. Obviously the outside of the pot would be as black as the kettle, so hence criticising someone for something that you yourself do.

Codswallop - Here's Yours!

My dh used to work in a warehouse many moons ago and actually heard, honest, someone say 'put wood in t'hole lad'....guess what it means?

(double points for any correct answers from the south)

olive oil - "shut the door" - my dad uses it all the time..

what about - "the bees knees" - Urghhh?

oops - just found it on butterflymum's excellent site

Janeway, gold star awarded.

I like the misheard lyrics sections! I always get the words to songs wrong (and amuse DP greatly doing so)

There was a radio thing on that some years ago wasnt there? I remember that one - "taking this crazy chance to pee on the lawn" (taking this crazy chance to be all alone)Oh, and theres a bit at the end of Toni Braxton's "unbreak my heart" where she repeatedly sings "sage & onion, sage & onion" Still dont know what that one really is.

You know it was anly really recently that I "got" the bees knees.... It's a play on words meaning "the business"... It just suddenly came to me one day "duh!"

yes, and it's cutting your nost off to "spite" your face, which makes more sense...

I always use silly phrases, and it was only when on business in the US, that I realised that I used these odd phrases, when they kept asking me what I was going on about!!!

My nothern grandparents were always saying "well, I'll go t' foot of our stairs..." and at bedtime, there was always a combination of such whimsies as "Up the apples and pears" (obv. cockney rhyming slang); up the wooden hill to bedfordshire, and one of my grandfathers: "up the golden dancers" (??!??!?!?!??)

And as for song lyrics - what about Sting's "Sue Lawley... Sue Lawley...."

Song lyrics:

Elvis Presley's 'Hot Banana Song'

Just wanna be
Hot banana
Your teddy bear
Hot banana, hot banana....etc

Bonnie Tyler's 'It's a Hard Egg'.

Sister sledge 'Giving love in a femidon'. (We are Family)

Madonna's 'La Isla Bonita' with 'young girls with eyes like potatoes'.

Billy Ocean's? classic 'Go and Get Stuffed'.

Paul Young : 'Every time you go away, you take a piece of meat with you.'