Ran into a very cool, helpful web site today. It's a British site that list thousands of 'phrases' and describes their meaning and origin. All arranged by the first letter of the phrase and displayed with a separate page for each letter.
What's fascinating is not just looking up unknown phrases, but seeing the staggering list of phrases available. A kind of vast 'menu' to pick from should you ever find yourself with 'phrase block' (a less severe form of 'writer's block')
Here's the Link (though do return):
http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/a.html
The majority of phrases are well known and might just invite a look into origin:
'A stitch in time'
'The buck stops here'
'A bird in the hand'
But some phrases I haven't run into like:
'All sixes and sevens'
'Hugger Mugger'
'Sex and Shopping'
And by far the most bizarre phrase:
'Dead Cat Bounce'
Wtf? When I read this one I thought it might be a creepy reference to the feelings that arose when some of my relationships ended. As in:
'Hi, Jim. So, I had a painful breakup with Amy yesterday. Yep, it was a real Dead Cat Bounce. I mean it felt like watching a dead cat fall from the 8th floor and bounce in front of me. Real Bad. Reminds me of breaking up with Jill last year- except that felt more like watching a donkey getting a root canal...'
Anyways... these guys also have a 'phrase thesaurus'. If you enter a concept (e.g. 'difficulty', 'faithfulness', etc) it suggests various phrases that might express it. But, since we all have to eat, this is where they impose a fee. You do get a few tries before having to pay, so it's worth a whirl.
Not surprsingly, their list of customers includes a large number of newspapers and tv stations. Guess we all need a little help from time to time...
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