AT A LOOSE END

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beachboy

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I FEEL RATHER AT A LOOSE END
Does it mean I'm bored because I have nothing to do, or something has happened and I don't know what to do? Is this expression common in the USA?
 

montfan

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I am not a teacher, and I looked up the idiom on this website.

It means the first one. It is not very common in the United States.
 

TheParser

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I FEEL RATHER AT A LOOSE END
Does it mean I'm bored because I have nothing to do, or something has happened and I don't know what to do? Is this expression common in the USA?


***** NOT A TEACHER *****


I believe that the expression is "at loose ends."
 

bhaisahab

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"At a loose end" is quite common in BrE.
 

Tdol

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We have at a loose end as BrE and at loose ends at AmE; is this correct? Thanks
 

TheParser

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We have at a loose end as BrE and at loose ends at AmE; is this correct? Thanks

Cambridge Dictionary Online says that "at a loose end" is British and

Australian, and "at loose ends" is American. Both mean "to have

nothing to do."

***

EnglishClub.com feels there is a difference:

"At loose ends" seems [my emphasis] to indicate a state of

unhappy restlessness that results from having nothing to do.

The British idiom simply means having nothing to do.
 

JMurray

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EnglishClub.com feels there is a difference:
"At loose ends" seems to indicate a state of unhappy restlessness that results from having nothing to do".


I feel the Aust/NZ use of "at a loose end" generally implies restlessness too.
 

probus

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On this one, Canada follows the American rather than the British usage -- at loose ends.
 
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