idioms

Salad days

| Masuma

Shakespeare mentions these in Antony & Cleopatra (Act 1, Scene 5)

β€œπ”π”Ά π”°π”žπ”©π”žπ”‘ π”‘π”žπ”Άπ”°, 𝔴π”₯𝔒𝔫 β„‘ π”΄π”žπ”° 𝔀𝔯𝔒𝔒𝔫 𝔦𝔫 𝔧𝔲𝔑𝔀𝔒π”ͺ𝔒𝔫𝔱”.

The reference is to the years of inexperienced youth – green is the fresh colour of young vegetables used in salads, and represents anyone who is young and lacking in experience. This also accounts for the use of the terms β€˜green’ and β€˜greenhorn’ for anyone considered to be a novice, raw hand, or simpleton.

P.S: and salad is delicious πŸ˜‹ with the right dressing of courseπŸ’š.

An Eager Beaver

| Masuma

An Eager Beaver is to describe anyone who is exceptionally keen and industrious or who volunteers to undertake all manners of jobs and then puts everything they have got into them.

Beavers are among the most intelligent and hardworking of animals as well as being remarkable β€˜engineers’, able to build dams, houses, canals and cut down trees. Besides rearing their own three or four at a time, they also take over the raising of orphaned beavers. The word β€˜eager’ is derived through the French aigre from the Latin acer , meaning sharp, keen.

P.S: mud, stones and wood, let’s build!

What a way to run a railway

| Masuma

π–œπ–π–†π–™ 𝖆 π–œπ–†π–ž 𝖙𝖔 π–—π–šπ–“ 𝖆 π–—π–†π–Žπ–‘π–œπ–†π–ž – This phrase became widely popular as the result of a cartoon which appeared in the American magazine Ballyhoo in 1932,
portraying a signalman looking out of his signal-box at two trains careering along the same line towards each other.
As he watches them about to collide head on he says, “Tch-Tch – what a way to run a railway!”

When my ship comes home

| Masuma

π‘Šβ„Žπ‘’π‘› π‘šπ‘¦ π‘ β„Žπ‘–π‘ π‘π‘œπ‘šπ‘’π‘  β„Žπ‘œπ‘šπ‘’ – refers to the days when the merchant traders waited for their ships to return laden with goods, which they hoped to sell at considerable profit, and thus make them rich. The phrase, when used today, no longer refers literally to ships, but to any circumstance that will suddenly provide one with a fortune. When this happens it will be a time to rejoice, or pay debts, or both. But, more often than not, the phrase is used when there is little chance of this happening.