My mother and my paternal grandmother each had some DOOZIES of "old-timey" sayings... These are NOT popular idioms you'll ever hear anyone else say, but they're still fun:
Mom: That (noun) was uglier than a mud fence dotted with tadpoles!
translation: so unattractive as to be downright humorous
Grandmom: That person doesn't just have a screw loose; s/he's missing a good-sized bolt!
translation: That person is imbalanced in mood or thought processes. ("crazy")
No, she never used that in reference to my mom... not within my hearing, anyway.
By the way, "doozy" is a "doozy" of an "old-timey saying that you MIGHT occasionally hear. It is basically a superlative, meaning "over the top" or "extreme(ly)" and can be used in a positive or negative connotation. The etymology (word origin) is interesting and fairly well described here: (from
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/doozy)
Quote:
Word Origin & History
doozy
also doozie , 1903 (adj.), 1916 (n.), perhaps an alteration of daisy , or from popular It. actress Eleonora Duse (1859-1924). In either case, reinforced by Duesenberg , expensive, classy make of automobile 1920s-30s.
*cough* So, anyway, back to your topic of CURRENT slang phrases and their meanings... I'll just crawl back under my
rock.
