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Funny English Idioms And Their Meanings
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Funny English Idioms And Their Meanings

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Roisin Hahesy is an Irish born children book illustrator, currently living in Brazil. After moving there, she also took up teaching the English language to locals and soon faced an interesting problem – translating the common English sayings and funny idioms, staying true to their meaning and wordplay.

Just to be clear, an idiom is an expression made up from words in such a way, that understanding them literally has no particular meaning. We understand what they mean, because of their popular use. Most common examples of idioms would probably be ‘over the moon’ or ‘see the light’ just to name a few.

Roisin has illustrated a couple of well known English expressions trying to reveal their meanings or just to show how funny it would look if we’d take them literally. Scroll down to see our pick of funny English idioms illustrated below!

More info: rosha.ie

As Cool As A Cucumber

Hold Your Horses

Kick The Bucket

Blue In The Face

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A Storm In A Teacup

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Bob’s Your Uncle

Head In The Clouds

Dead As A Doornail

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A Piece Of Cake

Heart In Your Mouth

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djbleyer avatar
DianeBleyer
Community Member
8 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

Remembered when Vietnamese boy in my room looked out the window when I said it was raining cats and dogs.

elysia_cryer avatar
ElysiaCryer
Community Member
8 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

I recently said to a non-American friend, "well now the cat's out of the bag!" and realized how totally bizarre that saying is! How on earth do I explain that one lol. Like, wtf was the cat doing in a bag in the 1st place?!?!

emma_butson_77 avatar
EmmaButson
Community Member
8 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

It comes from an old tale of a market scam, where the seller would offer a bagged live pig for a price, and instruct the buyer not to open the bag until they arrives home, what the buyer didn't know is that the bagged pig was really a cat. hence "letting the cat out of the bag" being to "uncover a secret or suprise"

Load More Replies...
nataliejorichards avatar
NatalieRichards
Community Member
8 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. My other half thinks I'm making that one up!

eduardvolff avatar
EdVoll
Community Member
8 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

We have some of these in romanian, but their meaning is a little different: "heart in the mouth" means that you are waiting for something anxiously and "head in the clouds" means that you are not a very attentive person

juliasandoval avatar
JuliaSandoval
Community Member
8 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

My family was at an amusement park with an Iranian exchange student. She didn't understand when I said that my son had "chickened out" of one of the rides. That really "blew me away"!

depewgrays avatar
LauraGray
Community Member
8 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

I grew up hearing these - people are making up new ones it seems these days

baconycakes1337 avatar
Bacony
Community Member
5 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

You forgot the elephant in the room... "In A Pickle".

carmelamaniquis avatar
carmelamaniquis
Community Member
8 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

Saw some misspelled words. It's not its. Frightened not frightend.

selchidh avatar
selchidh
Community Member
8 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

swedish proverbs top 5: -i suspect owls in the bog -a dog is buried here -there's no danger on the roof -you've got gnomes in the attic -a little dirt cleanses the belly.

martha.donaldson.980 avatar
MarthaDonaldson
Community Member
8 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

I'd never heard the 'storm in a teacup' one, but I know 'tempest in a teapot'.

djbleyer avatar
DianeBleyer
Community Member
8 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

Remembered when Vietnamese boy in my room looked out the window when I said it was raining cats and dogs.

elysia_cryer avatar
ElysiaCryer
Community Member
8 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

I recently said to a non-American friend, "well now the cat's out of the bag!" and realized how totally bizarre that saying is! How on earth do I explain that one lol. Like, wtf was the cat doing in a bag in the 1st place?!?!

emma_butson_77 avatar
EmmaButson
Community Member
8 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

It comes from an old tale of a market scam, where the seller would offer a bagged live pig for a price, and instruct the buyer not to open the bag until they arrives home, what the buyer didn't know is that the bagged pig was really a cat. hence "letting the cat out of the bag" being to "uncover a secret or suprise"

Load More Replies...
nataliejorichards avatar
NatalieRichards
Community Member
8 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. My other half thinks I'm making that one up!

eduardvolff avatar
EdVoll
Community Member
8 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

We have some of these in romanian, but their meaning is a little different: "heart in the mouth" means that you are waiting for something anxiously and "head in the clouds" means that you are not a very attentive person

juliasandoval avatar
JuliaSandoval
Community Member
8 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

My family was at an amusement park with an Iranian exchange student. She didn't understand when I said that my son had "chickened out" of one of the rides. That really "blew me away"!

depewgrays avatar
LauraGray
Community Member
8 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

I grew up hearing these - people are making up new ones it seems these days

baconycakes1337 avatar
Bacony
Community Member
5 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

You forgot the elephant in the room... "In A Pickle".

carmelamaniquis avatar
carmelamaniquis
Community Member
8 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

Saw some misspelled words. It's not its. Frightened not frightend.

selchidh avatar
selchidh
Community Member
8 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

swedish proverbs top 5: -i suspect owls in the bog -a dog is buried here -there's no danger on the roof -you've got gnomes in the attic -a little dirt cleanses the belly.

martha.donaldson.980 avatar
MarthaDonaldson
Community Member
8 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

I'd never heard the 'storm in a teacup' one, but I know 'tempest in a teapot'.

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