Figurative Language (you can bet your bootie)

[Crossbreed]

The glass is half full, not half empty! Newsflash, IT'S THE SAME THING!!!!

The Optimist sees the glass as half full.
The Pessimist sees the glass as half empty.
The Engineer sees twice as much glass as there needs to be...!

 

[Bolletje]

What makes you tick?

Nothing, I m a person, not a clock!

“What makes you tic” would be a far more interesting question.

 

[Intensate]

I cant stand when people say"and he/she turned around and said"

And one for Bolletje,I used to say "donkey smell" to people I did not like when I worked in Nederland instead of "dank je vell" and If questioned I said its dialect from Noordvijk and they accepted it

 

[WildCat]

"It's always the quiet ones who x" or something similar. That one used to grate my nerves.

No, I'm afraid it isn't always "the quiet ones". I didn't know quiet was a capital offense. Are manners and common decency taboo now?

 

[Iamnotarabot]

It's raining cats and dogs.

 

[Thinx]

It's raining cats and dogs.

I wish!

 

[GrownupGirl]

I like reading and learning about the origins behind figurative language. For example the saying "a taste of your medicine" came from an Aesop's fable about a quack doctor who was selling fake medicine to "cure" people, but then *he* became sick, and people told to just take his own medicine, which he knew would not work.

 

[Michael Balog]

One day at work a lady told her co worker "building boxes is in your genes" cause her mom works in shipping at my work. I thought to myself what does boxes have to do with her pants?

 

[Crossbreed]

The one that I sort of understand is "A stitch in time saves nine." I get that it means a small repair, now, saves having to make a big repair, later, but it always sounds anachronistic to me.

 

[Fino]

Actually I just don't like ANY figurative language! /endthread

 

[Thinx]

Actually I just don't like ANY figurative language! /endthread

So, you're saying, it's as if it was a pile of pooh?

 

[LateBloomer]

It means that someone is so focused on the details that they cannot see the "big" picture.

If you take a close-up look at a TV screen, you will see little dots (called pixels), but not the TV show. You have to stand back and view them collectively in order to enjoy the program.

Thanks , that makes sense .

 

[Fino]

So, you're saying, it's as if it was a pile of pooh?

Winnie the Pooh!

 

[jeffry7]

I still can't figure out what "don't throw stones in glass houses" is supposed to mean... I know that throwing a stone in a glass house would probably break the house, but... how is that relevant to anything?

This one is metaphorical. The glass house stands in for a fragile or delicate social position. Throwing stones means disparaging someone else.

If you had really bad taste in clothes and made fun of someone else for bad taste in clothes, It would only point out to the people listening your own bad taste.

The two sides don't have to share a foibel. It is just that if the side "casting the stone" is vulnerable to criticism, then maybe they should not be critical.

 

[Judge]

Perhaps an atheist thought up the saying, "Don't throw stones when you live in a glass house." Why? It might have been a tad awkward to say, "Let he who is without sin cast the first stone."

Even though both essentially imply that no one is perfect. I guess in this instance, the briefest version of such a meaning isn't necessarily the most plausible one. Go figure.