1993
a) Play truant
To stay away from school without permission
b) Play down
Make little of, minimize the importance of
A skillful salesman plays down the drawbacks of the product and emphasizes its good features. [First half of 1900s]
Play down to
Lower one’s standards to meet the demands of someone
Some stand-up comics deliberately play down to the vulgar taste of their audiences. [Late 1800s]
c) Turn turtle
Capsize, turn upside down
When they collided, the car turned turtle.
This expression alludes to the helplessness of a turtle turned on its back, where its shell can no longer protect it. [First half of 1800s]
d) Turn the corner
Pass a milestone or critical point, begin to recover.
Experts say the economy has turned the corner and is in the midst of an upturn. The doctor believes he’s turned the corner and is on the mend.
This expression alludes to passing around the corner in a race, particularly the last corner. [First half of 1800s]
e) A fair weather friend
A fair-weather friend is the type who is always there when times are good but forgets about you when things get difficult or problems crop up.
f) Under a cloud
If someone is suspected of having done something wrong, they are under a cloud.
g) Burn one’s boats / burn one’s boats
Commit oneself to an irreversible course.
Denouncing one’s boss in a written resignation means one has burned one’s bridges. Turning down one job before you have another amounts to burning your boats.
Both versions of this idiom allude to ancient military tactics, when troops would cross a body of water and then burn the bridge or boats they had used both to prevent retreat and to foil a pursuing enemy. [Late 1800s
h) Horse-trading
Negotiation marked by hard bargaining and shrewd exchange
The restaurant owner is famous for his horse trading; he’s just exchanged a month of free dinners for a month of free television commercials.
This expression alludes to the notorious shrewdness of horse traders, who literally bought and sold horses. [c. 1820]
1992
i) Between the devil and the deep sea
If you are caught between the devil and the deep blue sea, you are in a dilemma; a difficult choice
ii) A wild goose chase
A worthless hunt or chase; a futile pursuit
iii) Over head and ears
Time and tide
Let’s get on with the voting; time and tide won’t wait, you know.
This proverbial phrase, alluding to the fact that human events or concerns cannot stop the passage of time or the movement of the tides, first appeared about 1395 in Chaucer’s Prologue to the Clerk’s Tale.
The alliterative beginning, time and tide, was repeated in various contexts over the years but today survives only in the proverb, which is often shortened (as above).
v) To live from hand to mouth
With only the bare essentials, existing precariously
After she lost her job she was living from hand to mouth.
This expression alludes to eating immediately whatever is at hand. [c. 1500]
vi) To beat about the bush
If someone doesn’t say clearly what they mean and try to make it hard to understand, they are beating about (around) the bush.
vii) To fish in troubled waters
Try to take advantage of a confused situation
He often buys up stock in companies declaring bankruptcy; fishing in troubled waters generally pays off.
This term, first recorded in 1568, expresses the even older notion that fish bite more readily when seas are rough.
viii) A bird’s eye-view
If you have a bird’s eye view of something, you can see it perfectly clearly.
1991
a) Damocles’ sword
Impending disaster
The likelihood of lay-offs has been a sword of Damocles over the department for months. This expression alludes to the legend of Damocles, a servile courtier to King Dionysius I of
Syracuse. The king, weary of Damocles’ obsequious flattery, invited him to a banquet and seated him under a sword hung by a single hair, so as to point out to him the precariousness of his position.
The idiom was first recorded in 1747. The same story gave rise to the expression hang by a thread.
ii) Every inch
Completely, wholly
He was every inch a leader.
I had to argue this case every inch of the way.
iii) Spade a spade
Speak frankly and bluntly, be explicit
You can always trust Mary to call a spade a spade.
This term comes from a Greek saying, call a bowl a bowl, that was mistranslated into Latin by Erasmus and came into English in the 1500s.
iv) On the sky
Palm off
Pass off by deception, substitute with intent to deceive
The salesman tried to palm off a zircon as a diamond.
The producer tried to palm her off as a star from the Metropolitan Opera.
This expression alludes to concealing something in the palm of one’s hand. It replaced the earlier palm on in the early 1800s.
vi) Lip service
When people pay lip service to something, they express their respect, but they don’t act on their words, so the respect is hollow and empty.
vii) A turn coat
One who goes to work / fight / play for the opposing side, traitor
viii) A wild goose chase
A futile search or pursuit
I think she sent us on a wild goose chase looking for their beach house.
This idiom originally referred to a form of 16th-century horse racing requiring riders to follow a leader in a particular formation (presumably resembling a flock of geese in flight). Its figurative use dates from about 1600.
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