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Re: nonsensical idioms
Posted By: Howard, on host 205.184.139.81
Date: Monday, December 20, 1999, at 17:52:58
In Reply To: Re: nonsensical idioms posted by Mel on Monday, December 20, 1999, at 16:42:09:

> > > After over an hour of searching high and low and sideways and upside down for his missing electric screwdriver, my father, upon finding it exclaimed "It's always the *last* place you look!"
> > >
> > > Every time I hear this expression, it elicits a reaction similar to a sip of OJ after brushing your teeth. It's always the last place you look? Of course it is! Why on earth would you continue looking once you've found the thing?? Does this strike anyone else as a ridiculous statement of the obvious? Is there ever a place you look *after* finding something? Just to make certain it isn't there, too? Could you possibly find something in the second-to-last place you look? Even if you find the thing in the *first* place you look, isn't that place still the *last* place as well?
> > >
> > > Gr"just smile and nod..."ace
> >
> > Also some other phrases, that if you tihnk about them, dont make sense.
> >
> > People call hit and runs an accident.
> >
> > Coke means soda, Xerox means copy, and ketchup means catsup.
> >
> > Li-smiles and nods-face
>
> Another one is "right away". What? How do you combine the words "right" and "away" and come up with something that means "now"? I just don't get it.
>
> -M"what's everybody smiling and nodding at me for?"el

It might be a local idiom, but I hear people say, "I could care less." I think it means they don't care at all, but it confuses me. Shouldn't they say, "I couldn't care less."?
Howard

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