Thursday Thirteen #15

In honor of my friends Jeremy and Christie Tudor coming up for a visit next week, I decided to do a Thursday Thirteen for Jeremy, who never seems to get his cliches quite right. This one's for you, bud.

Thirteen of my Favorite Cliches:

1. My Heart Bleeds for You... meaning "I'm not really interested in your trouble." According to the Dictionary of Cliches, this is meant to be said with irony. "Once the saying was a sincere if hyperbolic expression of sympathy; it took its ironic turn in the 1940's."
2. This Neck of the Woods... meaning "Here in this region." An Americanism. This phrase originates from the Southwest. Originally "neck" in this sense was a narrow stretch of land or water.
3. How Do You Like Them Apples? meaning "What do you think of that (usually in contrast to something else)." Although the term originates in the marketplace comparing fruits, it now has a variety of meanings (and we won't go there). Of its first known usages, it appeared in an Albee play, The American Dream. The grandma responds to a story "How do you like them apples" and the rest was history.
   
4. How Now, Brown Cow? meaning "What's up? What next?" This is an old 18th century and obsolete way of referring to a barrel of beer, and it is likely that the saying was originally meant as a suggestion that everybody have another beer in order to prolong a pleasant interlude at the tavern. (I thought this was a Dr. Seussism!)
5. Go to Pot... meaning deteriorate or disintegrate. I thought this had something to do with either a toilet or the abuse of illegal drugs. Apparently, it has something to do with meat being cut into pieces for the cooking pot. Whatever.
6. A Fine-tooth Comb... meaning a figurative tool with which one conducts a thorough search or investigation. (This one gives me a mental image of either Spaceballs or a kid with an infection of lice.)
7. A-OK... meaning the situation couldn't be better. According to the Dictionary of Cliches, this is a space term first employed by John A. Powers, spokesperson for NASA. He used it to signal success with a manned space flight in the early 60's.
8. Cat's Meow... meaning that something is nifty or remarkable. It has other common forms such as, "the cat's whiskers" and "the cat's pajamas." Since cats have the ability to look enormously pleased, it is likely that these expressions derived from that appearance of satisfaction.
9. You Can Catch More Flies With Honey Than With Vinegar... meaning that you are more likely to get what you want by being pleasant than by being harsh. This saying is from the 17th century from Thomas Fuller. I like this phrase, but I can never say it right.
10. Bite the Dust... meaning to die in a fracas or to suffer a severe setback. Homer uses this in the Iliad, "May his fellow warriors...fall round him to the earth and bite the dust," it war particularly popular in the many tales of skirmishes between white men and Indians in the American west.
    
11. Mess with a Bull and You'll Get the Horns... meaning exactly what it says. Does anyone remember what movie this quote is from?
12. Wear Your Heart On Your Sleeve... this is from Shakespeare (Othello)! It means to show your emotions or feelings plainly. It was once a custom for a young man to attach to his sleeve a gift from a young lady he loved thus displaying his feelings.
13. Waste of Breath...meaning not worth saying (or putting it in a Thursday Thirteen). The concept comes from Vergil's Aeneid.

Shew! And another Thursday Thirteen bites the dust!