What are some of your favorite or most-used idioms?

[Skrej]

I decided this rotation to add some daily idioms to start off each class lesson.

I'm starting off with the ones I find myself using frequently, but I thought I'd pitch the question to forum instructors, and even advanced learners.

What are some of your favorite idioms, and what are some you hear or use the most frequently?

Rather than organizing them around a weekly theme (i.e. color idioms, body idioms, etc.) I'd like to focus on ones they're more likely to hear.


On a funny side note, I included 'break a leg' in yesterday's list. After explaining what it meant, one of my students got a horrified look on her face, and said she'd hear her son say that his friend last week.

Thinking it was a literal meaning, she apparently reprimanded him for saying 'mean things' to other people, lecturing him on how he shouldn't be a bully, and should be kind to people, etc.

She said she didn't believe him when he tried telling her it was actually something nice, and thought he was just trying to avoid getting in trouble. :lol:

 

[Tarheel]

"Kill two birds with one stone" comes to mind for some reason. I think I have used that one myself fairly recently.

 

[Tdol]

I do like not my cup of tea.

 

[Tarheel]

Here's one:

They're on a roll.

The Syracuse team beat Virginia to get to the Final Four. They're on a roll. However, they play the Tar Heels next, and the Tar Heels are unstoppable. They are going to steamroll Syracuse. (Of course, I'll have to eat my words if the Tar Heels lose.)

 

[MikeNewYork]

Raining cats and dogs.

 

[Tdol]

I like plain as a pikestaff, though it isn't used much today.

 

[Raymott]

One of my favourite Aussie idioms.
Thirsty - "I'm as dry as a dead dingo's donger."

 

[emsr2d2]

I use "I wouldn't touch it/him/her with a bargepole" quite a lot.

 

[GoesStation]

I use "I wouldn't touch it/him/her with a bargepole" quite a lot.

For some reason, Americans prefer not to touch something with a ten-foot pole.

We have a vulgar version of that one. It has to do with avoiding sexual relations with someone, even using another person's apparatus.

 

[GoesStation]

One of my favourite Aussie idioms.
Thirsty - "I'm as dry as a dead dingo's donger."

A local exclamation of praise is "That's slicker'n deer guts on a doorknob!"

 

[Tarheel]

How about:

deader than a door knob.

 

[emsr2d2]

I've never heard that in BrE though we use "dead as a doorknob".

 

[Amigos4]

One of my favorites:

"Elvis has left the building!" (The show has come to an end. It's all over.)

 

[Tarheel]

"He puts himself on a pedestal" is one that came to mind recently.

 

[Amigos4]

"Speak of the devil!" (Used when the person you have just been talking about arrives.)

 

[Tarheel]

"Hit the nail on the head" is a good one.

 

[Amigos4]

"Don't give up your day job!" (You are not very good at something. You could definitely not do it professionally.)

 

[emsr2d2]

"Speak of the devil!" (Used when the person you have just been talking about arrives.)

In BrE, that's "Talk of the devil!"

 

[Raymott]

I've never heard that in BrE though we use "dead as a doorknob".

I only know "Deaf as a doorknob/doornail".
http://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/be+as+deaf+as+a+doorknob

 

[emsr2d2]

"Deaf as a post" in BrE!