b/f

• bf

(SMS) boyfriend

babe in the woods

• babe in the wood
• babe
• woods
• wood

a person who is inexperienced; a naive, trusting person
Example:
Peter knew his way around junior high, but now in high school he's just a babe in the woods.
Etymology:
In 1595 a story called "The Children in the Wood" was published in England. It was about a greedy uncle who was supposed to be taking care of his rich niece and nephew. Instead, he hired two men to kill them so he could inherit their money. One of the men took pity on the children and left them in the woods rather than kill them. They did not survive. That's why we can say that inexperienced people or people that can't take care of themselves and can easily be misled or exploited are "babes in the woods".

bablatrice

• babbler

a female babbler

babymoon

• babymooner
• Babymooning
• familymoon

A special holiday taken by parents-to-be before their first baby is born.
Related words:
babymoon (v.), babymooner (n.), babymooning (n.)
Examples:
1) Getting in one last jaunt for two before baby makes three has become a hot trend among expecting couples. It's been called a babymoon. ("ABC News", 18th February 2006)
2) Babymooning seemed like a last chance for romance, to enjoy uninterrupted hours in art galleries, to linger over a foreign-brewed coffee, to see a movie, to finally read "A Tale of Two Cities". (globeandmail.com <http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/ArticleNews/TPStory/ LAC/20050813/BABYMOON13/TPTravel/>, 13th August 2005)
3) Babymooners are looking for special gifts and tokens that will remind them of their trip. ("Seattle Post Intelligencer", 24th April 2006) History, related words: You're a twosome about to become a threesome. Before the cycle of round-the-clock feeding and endless nappy changing begins, why not have a special holiday, your last chance to have a romantic, carefree, just-the-two-of-you vacation? There are so many expectant couples doing just this that we now have a new term for it - the babymoon. Parents-to-be who love to travel see a babymoon as the final opportunity to relax in far-flung locations before adjusting to the new reality of pushchairs, baby food and sleepless nights! In the past few years the babymoon has grown in popularity, partly because people are travelling further and more frequently, and also because it is now considered perfectly safe for pregnant women to fly up to their 36th week of pregnancy, providing there are no other complications. A very appealing prospect for mums-to-be, travel companies have seized on the babymoon concept as a marketing opportunity, putting together special packages for babymooners. These might include pamper sessions for the mother, special menus (anyone fancy pickles and ice cream?), cigars for Dad, and a babymoon suite with chocolates and& not champagne, but sparkling non-alcoholic cider. The term "babymoon" is of course a blend of "baby" and "honeymoon", a mid 16th-century compound word where "honey" referred to a marriage's sweetness' and "moon" to how long it would last, like the changing aspect of the moon. The expression "babymoon" was coined in the early nineties by pregnancy and childbirth author Sheila Kitzinger, who described it as a calm, uninterrupted period of time needed by parents after the birth of a baby so that they can spend time bonding with their new arrival. However, Kitzinger's original meaning seems to have been eclipsed by the more recent last fling before the baby arrives' sense. A related neologism is the term "familymoon", which refers to a honeymoon where the bride and groom are accompanied by children from previous marriages or relationships.

bacchanalia

• bacchanalian

[bak-uh-NAIL-yuh]
1. (plural, capitalized) The ancient Roman festival in honor of Bacchus, celebrated with dancing, song, and revelry.
2. A riotous, boisterous, or drunken festivity; a revel.
Examples:
1) Alpha Epsilon brothers began their bacchanalia with an off-campus keg party featuring "funneling," in which beer is shot through a rubber hose into the drinker's mouth. (Adam Cohen, "Battle of the Binge," Time, September 8, 1997)
2) This is not at all to suggest that the Revolution was a sort of non-stop bacchanalia, but that partial drunkenness was often an important component in a certain type of revolutionary excitability, particularly in meetings or committees. (Richard Cobb, "The French and Their Revolution")
Etymology, related words:
"Bacchanalia" comes from Latin, from Bacchus, god of wine, from Greek Bakkhos. The adjective form is "bacchanalian". One who celebrates the Bacchanalia, or indulges in drunken revels, is a bacchanal ([BAK-uh-nuhl; bak-uh-NAL]), which is also another term for a drunken or riotous celebration.

bachelor party

• bachelors party
• bachelor
• party
• bachelors

Also: bachelors party
A party thrown for a groom shortly before his wedding; a stag party held for a bachelor (usually on the night before he is married).
Example:
Bob Sawyer is one of her lodgers; he owes her rent, which this little fierce woman bounces in to demand just before his guests arrive for a bachelor party. (Burgis, Nina; Slater, Michael; Bentley, Nicolas. "The Dickens index". - Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990)

back burner

• back
• burner
• put smth. on the back burner
• put smth. on
• the back burner
• put

1. A rear burner on a stovetop.
2. (slang) The place of low priority, secondary position; not an urgent priority.
Examples:
1) To put something on the back burner is to put something off until later.
2) We worked hard on the project at first, but when a new project came along, we put it on the back burner.
Etymology:
The 'back burner' of a stove is where you put things that are slowly cooking, and that you can leave alone for a while.

back out

• back

To get out of an unwanted situation; to withdraw or retreat from a previous engagement; to leave or get away from something.
Examples:
1) You can't back out of the deal now--you signed your name on the contract. 2) I'm going to back out on our plan to go to Canada for spring break - I'm going to Hawaii instead.

back seat driver

• backseat driver
• back seat
• backseat
• driver
• back
• seat

Someone who gives unwanted advice; someone who tries to run things even though they don't have the power or authority to do so; a bossy person who tells another person what to do.
Examples:
1) Rob is the worst back seat driver I know - he's always telling me what to do. 2) I wish I could tell my boss to stop being such a back seat driver. I don't need to hear his comments every ten minutes!
3) I can fix that computer myself, but she always tries to be a backseat driver.
Etymology:
When automobiles became popular in the United States in the 1920s, many rich people rode around in the backseats of chauffeur-driven cars. The backseat passenger gave orders to the front-seat driver: where to go, what road to take, how fast to drive, and so on; this is usually more annoying than helpful. Today "backseat driver" refers to any aggressive person, in or out of a car, who tries to tell others what to do. This phrase can be used to make fun of someone who is giving unwanted advice.
back stabber

• back
• stabber
• double crosser
• double
• crosser

One who attacks another person unfairly, and without warning; one who secretly plots against a friend.
Examples:
1) You shouldn't trust Mark - he's a back stabber. 2) I've heard that Greedie Corporation is a terrible place to work, because the company is filled with back stabbers and liars.
Etymology:
You can't see your 'back', or the rear part of your body. So if someone 'stabs' or attacks you from behind, you can't see it coming to defend yourself. This phrase usually is used to describe arguments and verbal attacks, not physical ones. Synonym: double crosser

back to square one

• be back to square one
• back to the drawing board
• be back to the drawing board
• drawing board
• be back to
• square one
• back to
• square
• back
• board
• drawing

return to the beginning because of a failure to accomplish the desired result.
Example:
Our design for a solar-powered washing machine didn't work, so it's back to square one.
Etymology:
There are many board and street games that have squares or boxes. Each player must start at the first square and try to advance to the finish line or last box to win. If, for any reason, you have to go back to square one, you're starting over from the beginning.
Synonym:
A similar saying is "back to the drawing board", where architects begin blueprints or sketches for each project. When a project fails to work out, you may have to start over again from the original
drawings to improve your chances for success.
back to the drawing board

• Back to
• drawing board
• Back
• drawing
• back to square one
• board
• square one
• square

To begin again; to repeat a process, often after a major setback. People use this saying when something they're doing doesn't work out, and they feel as though they need to start over from the beginning.
Examples:
1) Professor Hoopeldinger had to go back to the drawing board after his experiment blew up. 2) Our sales plan isn't working, so I guess it's back to the drawing board!
3) "Ahmad, what are you doing?" asked his mother. "I'm trying to write a poem for Kim's birthday. But it doesn't sound right. I think I need to go back to the drawing board."
Etymology:
If the initial design for a building or aircraft fails, the designer has to go back to his or her work table and begin again.
Synonym: back to square one.
bad
1. poor, wretched, inferior, defective, awful, worthless, miserable, egregious, execrable, substandard, unsatisfactory, disappointing, inadequate, non-standard; (colloq.) lousy, rotten, crummy; (Slang Brit.) grotty, naff.
Examples:
Sometimes they would send him a letter, but he was a bad correspondent.
We went to see a rather bad play the other night.
2. corrupt, polluted, vitiated, debased, base, vile, foul, rotten, miasmic, noxious, mephitic, unhealthy, poisonous, injurious, dangerous, harmful, hurtful, pernicious, deleterious, ruinous.
Example: It wasn't healthy to be so near the bad air of the sewer.
3. evil, ill, immoral, wicked, vicious, vile, sinful, depraved, awful, villainous, corrupt, amoral, criminal, wrong, unspeakable.
Example: The man was thoroughly bad and deserved everything he got.
4. unpleasant, offensive, disagreeable, inclement, severe, awful, unfavourable, adverse, inclement, unpleasant; (colloq.) lousy, rotten.
Example: Surely you're not going sailing in this bad weather?!
5. unfavourable, unlucky, unpropitious, unfortunate, inauspicious, troubled, grim, distressing, discouraging, unpleasant.
Example: Agreeing to do that job might yet turn out to have been a bad decision.
6. off, tainted, spoilt or spoiled, mouldy, stale, rotten, decayed, putrefied, putrid, contaminated.
Example: The fridge isn't working and all the food has gone bad. She ate a bad egg and felt ill the next day.
7. irascible, ill-tempered, grouchy, irritable, nasty, peevish, cross, crotchety, crabby, cranky, curmudgeonly.
Example: Don't go near the boss - he's been in a bad mood all day.
8. sorry, regretful, apologetic, contrite, rueful, sad, conscience-stricken, remorseful, upset.
Example: She felt bad about having invited me.
9. sad, depressed, unhappy, dejected, downhearted, disconsolate, melancholy; inconsolable.
Example: I feel bad about you losing your purse.
10. naughty, ill-behaved, misbehaving, disobedient, unruly, wild; mischievous.
Example: Ronnie isn't a bad boy, he's just bored.
11. distressing, severe, grave, serious, terrible, awful, painful.
Example: He was laid up with a bad case of the mumps.
bad egg

• bad
• egg
• good egg

A troublemaker; someone who has a bad attitude and causes trouble.
Examples:
1) Emily is a real bad egg - she's always starting fights and causing trouble. 2) We have to get rid of the bad eggs in the accounting department.
Etymology: In this phrase, 'egg' means 'person' or 'individual'. This is probably because the human head looks a lot like an egg. A bad egg, then, is a simply a bad person. There is a similar phrase to describe a good person - a 'good egg'.

bad hat

• bad
• hat

(Brit., inform.) 1. a villain, as in a cowboy movie; bad guy.
(See: black hat.)
bad-mouth

• badmouth
• bad
• mouth

To say negative things about someone or something.
Examples:
1) Lisa bad-mouthed her boss at the water cooler. 2) I wish people would stop bad-mouthing Cleveland. It's really a very nice city. Etymology:
'Bad' means not good, and 'mouth' refers to the physical act of speech.

badinage
[bad-n-AHZH]
Light, playful talk; banter.
Examples:
1) Ken was determined to put the cares of the world behind him and do what he loved best - having a few celebrity friends round and enjoying an evening of anecdote and badinage over a bottle or two of vintage bubbly and some tasty cheese straws. (Bel Littlejohn, "My moustache man," The Guardian, March 24, 2000)
2) The badinage was inconsequential, reduced to who knew whom and wasn't the weather glorious in St. Tropez, or the Bahamas, Hawaii, or Hong Kong? (Robert Ludlum, "The Matarese Countdown")
Etymology:
"Badinage" comes from French, from "badiner" ("to trifle, to joke"), "badin" ("playful, jocular").

bagatelle
[bag-uh-TEL]
1. A trifle; a thing of little or no importance.
2. A short, light musical or literary piece.
3. A game played with a cue and balls on an oblong table having cups or arches at one end.
Examples:
1) Don't worry about that, a mere bagatelle, old boy! (Eric Ellis, "Error Message," Time, February 10, 2000)
2) You know how it often happens; these strifes and disputes frequently originate from a mere bagatelle. (Alessandro Manzoni, "I Promessi Sposi")
3) Excepting the regulars, the troops were raw as were likewise most of their officers; and this march of twenty-seven miles, which a year later would have been considered a bagatelle, was now a mighty undertaking. (James Ford Rhodes, "History of the Civil War")
4) So if you eat at his restaurant every day - off the menu, of course - and slosh the grub down with a 1966 Chateau Margaux (?800-?1,000 a bottle in a restaurant), even a Ritz bill will seem a mere bagatelle. ("Do you take cash?" The Guardian, December 23, 1999)
Etymology:
"Bagatelle" derives from Italian "bagattella" ("a trifling matter; a bagatelle"), perhaps ultimately from Latin "baca" ("a berry").

bail out

• bail
• bale out
• bale

Also: bale out
1. Free on bail.
2. Empty water out of boat. Example:
They were bailing water out as the boat slowly sank 3. Parachute from plane. 4. Escape from difficult situation.
Example: When the company hit the skids, she was the first to bail out. 5. Help somebody out of trouble.
Example:
The government had bailed the company out with the equivalent of 2.7 billion euros in aid.
6. Abandon a project or enterprise.
Examples with "bale out":
1) Von Brauchitsch threw the steering wheel out of the car and baled out. ("Independent", 18 Feb. 2003)
2) "He was heading for a stone wall and I didn't fancy jumping that so I baled out", he said after the horse had been caught and returned safely. ("Daily Telegraph", 11 Feb. 2004)
Difference, etymology:
"Bale" is the correct spelling when we're referring to a large bound parcel or closely pressed package of some substance, such as cotton, hay or paper. This comes ultimately from an old Germanic word that's related to "ball". On the other hand, when we're clearing water from the bottom of a boat, we correctly "bail" it out, from French "baille" ("a bucket"). And if we're speaking of the temporary release of a person from prison while awaiting trial, that's "bail", too, but it comes from yet a different source, an Old French word meaning custody or jurisdiction, itself from Latin "bajulare", to bear a burden: when someone bails a person from prison, he's taking on the responsibility of ensuring that the accused person will turn up for his trial. Among other senses, British readers know that the crosspieces bridging the stumps in cricket are also called bails; this is from the Old French "baile", meaning a palisade or enclosure, perhaps from Latin "baculum", a rod or stick. The common figurative sense of getting somebody or something out of trouble comes either from the boat dewatering or the parachuting sense, probably the latter. The legal and cricket senses are always "bail", no doubt. There's more confusion about the "tote that bale" and "bail that boat" senses, though dictionaries are clear those spellings are the correct ones. The aircraft one is rather more of a problem. From the early evidence, aviators thought that telling the crew to escape from an aircraft in danger was like bailing water out of a boat. Eric Partridge, in "A Dictionary of Forces' Slang" (1948), gives this as the origin. However, to muddy the waters still further, he spells the term as "bale out". The "Oxford English Dictionary" concurs in that spelling, and suggests that people may have been influenced in spelling it that way by the image of an escaping airman being a bale or bundle thrown through the aircraft door. (Or could it be that the parachute itself was viewed as such a bundle?) The current position is that when the idea concerns escaping from some potentially difficult situation, American English virtually always uses "bail out", perhaps under the influence of the legal sense of "bail". British English seems to be divided about 50:50 between that and "bale out".
bailiwick
1. A person's specific area of knowledge, authority, interest, skill, or work.
2. The office or district of a bailiff.
Examples:
1) I'll give it a try, but this is not my bailiwick. (Sue Grafton, "'L' Is for Lawless")
2) He "professed ignorance, as of something outside my bailiwick". (Marc Aronson, "Wharton and the House of Scribner: The Novelist as a Pain in the Neck", New York Times, January 2, 1994)
3) Fund-raising was Cliff's bailiwick, anyway, and he seemed to have it in hand. (Curt Sampson, "The Masters")
Etymology:
"Bailiwick" comes from Middle English "baillifwik", from "baillif", "bailiff" (ultimately from Latin "bajulus" - "porter, carrier") + "wik" ("town"), from Old English "wic", from Latin "vicus" ("village").

baker's dozen

• baker's
• dozen
• baker

thirteen of anything for the price of twelve
Example:
At the garage sale, we charged 76 cents per baseball card or $9 for a baker's dozen.
Etymology:
A dozen of anything is twelve. Then why a "baker's dozen" is thirteen? Hundreds of years ago some English bakers cheated their customers by baking air pockets into loaves of bread, making them lightweight. In 1266 the English Parliament passed a law that said that bakers who sold underweight bread would be severely punished. To be sure they were selling enough bread to meet the new weight regulations, the bakers started giving thirteen loaves for every dozen a customer ordered.

baksheesh
[BAK-sheesh]
payment (as a tip or bribe) to expedite service
Example:
The baksheesh that Uncle Jim slipped the maitre d' magically got us the next available table, vanishing the hour- long wait.
Etymology:
"Baksheesh" came into the English language around 1760 and was most likely picked up by British subjects as they traveled abroad. In Asia, English speakers would have heard "baksheesh" used as a word for "gratuity, a present of money, tip" - a meaning they directly adopted. Etymologically speaking, "baksheesh" is from Persian "bakhshish", which is also the source of the word "buckshee", meaning "something extra obtained free", "extra rations", or "windfall, gratuity". "Buckshee" is strictly a British English term and is not used in American English. Like "baksheesh", it too is dated circa 1760.

baleful

• baneful

[BAIL-ful]
1. Deadly or pernicious in influence.
2. Foreboding or threatening evil.
Example:
"What are you doing here?" I heard someone hiss, and I whirled around to see Sandra giving me a baleful glare.
Etymology, related words, more examples:
The "bale" of "baleful" comes from the Old English "bealu" ("evil"), and the "bane" of the similar-looking "baneful" comes from the Old English "bana" ("slayer, murderer"). "Baleful" and "baneful" are alike in meaning as well as appearance, and they are sometimes used in quite similar contexts - but they usually differ in emphasis. "Baleful" typically describes what threatens or portends evil (e.g., "a baleful look," "baleful predictions"). "Baneful" applies typically to what causes evil or destruction (e.g., "a baneful secret," "the baneful bite of the serpent"). Both words are used to modify terms like "influence," "effect," and "result," and in such uses there is little that distinguishes them.

bamboozle

• bubble
• put

[bam-BOO-zul]
1. To deceive by underhanded methods.
Synonyms: dupe, hoodwink
2. To confuse, frustrate, or throw off thoroughly or completely.
Example:
Tommy bamboozled his parents into believing he was too sick to go to school.
History, related words:
In 1710, Irish author Jonathan Swift wrote an article on "the continual Corruption of our English Tongue" in which he complained of "the Choice of certain Words invented by some pretty Fellows." Among the inventions Swift disliked were "bamboozle," "bubble" (a dupe), "put" (a fool), and "sham." (Perhaps he objected to the use of "sham" as a verb; he himself had used the adjective meaning "false" a couple of years previously.) What all these words appear to have in common is a connection to the underworld as jargon of criminals. Other than that, the origin of "bamboozle" remains a mystery, but the over-300-year-old word has clearly defied Swift's assertion that "All new affected Modes of Speech ... are the first perishing Parts in any Language."

banal
[BAY-nul; buh-NAL; buh-NAHL]
(British) Commonplace; trivial; hackneyed; trite.
Examples:
1) Perhaps it's just the arrogant, knowing way in which reporters ask the most banal of questions. (Alfred Alcorn, "Murder in the Museum of Man")
2) How does the poet transform his banal thoughts (are not most thoughts banal?) into such stunning forms, into beauty? (Joyce Carol Oates, "Speaking of Books: The Formidable W.B. Yeats," New York Times, September 7, 1969)
3) All that her late companions can draw from her is the banal declaration, that she "never knew what happiness was before." (New Monthly Magazine, LIX. 458, 1840)
Etymology, more about pronunciation:
"Banal" comes from the Old French word "ban" (an edict), which had the adjective "banal" ("of or relating to compulsory feudal service", which evolved to signify "merely obligatory," hence "commonplace"). In his "Big Book of Beastly Mispronunciations", Charles Harrington Elster notes, "'Banal' is a word of many pronunciations, each of which has its outspoken and often intractable proponents. Though it may pain some to hear it, let the record show that BAY-nul is the variant preferred by most authorities (including me)."

bang for the buck

• bang
• buck

Value for money being spent; high relative worth.
Examples:
1) The new Mars exploration rocket gives researchers good bang for the buck. 2) I really like those new Toyota sports cars - they give you a lot of bang for the buck.
Etymology: This phrase dates back to World War II, when it referred to weapons that were cheap but destructive.

banshee
a female spirit in Gaelic folklore whose appearance or wailing warns a family that one of them will soon die.
Example:
My Irish grandmother claimed to have heard a banshee wailing outside her bedroom window just two days before my grandfather died.
Etymology:
In Irish folklore, a "bean sidhe" (literally "woman of fairyland") was not a welcome guest. When she was seen combing her hair or heard wailing beneath a window, it was considered a sign that a family member was about to die. English speakers modified the mournful fairy's Irish name into the modern word "banshee" - a term we now most often use to evoke her woeful or terrible or earsplitting cry, as in "to scream like a banshee", or attributively, "a banshee wail".

bark is worse than one's bite

• bark is worse than your bite
• bark
• worse
• bite

the way a person sounds is much more frightening than the way she or he acts; the threat is often worse than the action taken.
Example:
The new director yells a lot, but her bark is worse than her bite.
Etymology:
This expression was used as far back as the mid-1600s. A dog barking ferociously sounds like he could actually bite your head off. But if the dog does not hurt you, then his bark is worse than his bite.
bark up the wrong tree

• barking up the wrong tree
• barking up
• barking
• bark up
• bark
• wrong
• tree

To look for something in the wrong place; to be mistaken; to direct your attention or efforts toward the wrong person or thing; to have the wrong idea about something.
Examples:
1) Tanya tried to get some money from her uncle, but she was barking up the wrong tree - he doesn't have a dime! 2) If you're looking for a new job, Ted, you're barking up the wrong tree. We aren't hiring right now.
3) Maria's uncle wanted to make her into a magician, but he was barking up the wrong tree. Her brother, Juan, was the one who loved tricks.
Etymology:
During colonial times in America, raccoon hunting was a popular sport. Trained dogs would chase a raccoon up a tree and bark furiously at the base until the hunter came.
Sometimes a raccoon could escape to the branches of another tree, leaving the dog barking up the wrong tree.
Generally speaking, a dog will chase its prey (such as a cat) until it runs up a tree. The dog then barks to tell its owner where the prey is. Sometimes, the dog might get confused, and bark at the 'wrong tree' where there is no prey.
Today, you can "bark up the wrong tree" if you're on a wrong course of action, have your attention redirected from your intentional object, or choose the wrong person to deal with.
baroque
1. relating to a style of artistic expression prevalent especially in the 17th century that is noted for its use of complex forms, bold ornamentation, and contrasting elements to evoke tension;
2. characterized by grotesqueness, extravagance, complexity, or flamboyance
Example:
Marcia's taste was for straightforward, contemporary design, so naturally she was not impressed by the baroque decor in the bed-and-breakfast.
Etymology:
"Baroque" came to English from a French word meaning "irregularly shaped". At first, the word in French was used mostly to refer to pearls. Eventually, it came to describe an extravagant style of art characterized by curving lines, gilt, and gold. This type of art, which dated from about 1550 to 1750, was sometimes considered to be excessively decorated and overly complicated. It makes sense, therefore, that the meaning of the word "baroque" has broadened to include anything that seems too ornate or elaborate. Labeling something "baroque" is usually uncomplimentary now, despite the fact that it was certainly a legitimate art form in its time.

bas-relief

• basso-relievo

[bah-ri-LEEF]
Sculptural relief in which the projection from the surrounding surface is slight and no part of the modeled form is undercut; also: a sculpture executed in bas-relief.
Example:
Jamal admired the bas-reliefs carved into the walls of the ancient Assyrian palace.
History, related words:
The best way to understand the meaning of "bas-relief" is to see one - and the easiest way to do that is to pull one out of your pocket. Just take out a penny, nickel, or other coin and examine the raised images on it; they're all bas-reliefs. English speakers adopted "bas-relief" from French (where "bas" means "low" and "relief" means "raised work") during the mid-1600s. A few decades earlier, they also borrowed the synonymous "basso-relievo" from Italian. The French and Italian terms have common ancestors (and, in fact, the French word is likely a translation of the Italian), but English speakers apparently borrowed the two independently. "Bas-relief" is more prevalent in English today, although the Italian-derived term has not disappeared completely from the language.

basic
simple and without anything more than necessary; rudimentary
Examples:
I'm afraid the hotel is a bit basic.
My knowledge of car engines is pretty basic.
In the dacha living conditions are pretty basic.
basket case

• a basket case
• basket
• case

1. (slang) A person who is extremely nervous or anxious, in bad shape and cannot function properly.
Example:
If Gloria has one more crisis, she'll be a basket case.
2. Crazy; hopelessly broken down; a lunatic, an emotionally unstable person, a dysfunctional person.
Examples:
1) After his wife left him, Paul was a real basket case. 2) The corporation was such a basket case that the owners had to shut it down.
Etymology:
From World War I lingo, used to describe a soldier so badly wounded that he had to be carried in a basket.

batten down the hatches

• batten down the hatches
• batten down the hatch
• down the hatches
• down the hatch
• batten down
• down
• hatches
• batten
• hatch

to get ready for trouble; prepare for any emergency
Example:
We'd better batten down the hatches: The weather service says a tropical storm is headed our way.
Etymology:
This is a nautical term that comes from the early 1800s. On a ship, sailors prepared for stormy weather by nailing waterproof pieces of canvas and wood (battens) over the entryways (hatches) to the cargo area below the main deck. Today you "batten down the
hatches" when you prepare for any kind of trouble.
batty
slightly mad; crazy or eccentric
Example: She's quite batty, and her way of behaviour will drive me mad, too.

bawl smb. out

• bawl out
• bawl

(Amer.) to speak angrily; reprimand
Example: She bawled me out for being late.
bbs
(SMS) be back soon

be crazy about

• crazy about
• be mad about
• mad about
• crazy
• mad
• about

Be immoderately fond of or infatuated with
Example:
I'm crazy about lobster, or George is mad about his new saxophone.
History:
The first expression dates from the early 1900s.
Synonym:
be mad about
be friends with smb.

• make friends with smb.
• be friends with
• make friends with
• be friends
• make friends
• make
• friend
• friends
• friends with smb.
• friends with

To be or become a friend of smb.
Examples:
1) They had a quarrel, but they're friends again now.
2) Simon finds it hard to make friends with other children.
3) How do I resign when I'm friends with with my boss?
be hooked

• hook
• hooked

To be addicted; to like something so much that you need it every day.
Example:
1) I'm really hooked on the hamburgers at Junior's. 2) I really like Holly, my new girlfriend. After just two dates, I'm hooked!
Etymology:
A 'hook' is a curved piece of metal used to catch something, like a fish hook. If you are 'hooked' on something, it has caught you and won't let go. This term was originally used by drug addicts to describe the feeling of needing drugs, and now it used to describe anything that is so good that you want it every day.

be hung up on

• hung up on
• be hung up on smb.
• be hung up on smth.
• be hung up
• hang up on
• hung up
• hang up
• hung
• hang

To be obsessed about something or someone.
Example:
I'm really hung up on Anna - I can't get her out of my mind!
Etymology:
If you are 'hung up' on something, you are caught and cannot move freely. 'Hung' is from 'hang', which means 'to attach from above' or 'to suspend'. So whatever you are hung up on, it has you on its hook, and you're swinging helplessly like a fish pulled from the ocean.

be in a funk

• funk
• in a funk
• get the Monday-morning blues
• get the blues
• Monday-morning
• get
• the blues
• blues
• the Monday-morning blues
• Monday-morning blues

In a bad mood, frustrated, in a snit; depressed or upset.
Examples:
1) This winter weather really has me in a funk. 2) Holly is in a funk about her new haircut. She thinks it's much too short.
3) Rick is in a funk today because Muriel hasn't called him.
Synonyms: get the blues; get the Monday-morning blues
Etymology:
"Funk" is derived from the Flemish word "fonck", meaning "disturbed" or "agitated".

be in hand

• in hand
• hand

1. Be under control.
Example: The work is well in hand and should be finished by 4 p.m.
2. Be spare or left over to use
Example: When I've paid all the bills, I shall still have about three hundred pound(s) in hand.
be up in arms

• up in arms
• be up in arms about smth.
• be up in arms over smth.
• be up in arms about
• be up in arms over
• up in arms about smth.
• up in arms over smth.
• up in arms about
• up in arms over
• be up in arms about smth.
• be up in arm
• arms
• arm
• up in arm

be very angry and ready to argue or fight
Examples:
They were up in arms about the introduction of new rules.
The women are up in arms over/about their low rate of pay.
beacon
1. sign, signal;
2. a signal fire to notify of the approach of an enemy, or to give any notice, commonly of warning;
3. a signal or conspicuous mark erected on an eminence near the shore, or moored in shoal water, as a guide to mariners;
4. a high hill near the shore;
5. that which gives notice of danger.
Example: Modest doubt is called the beacon of the wise.
6. fire; a signal fire; a fire (usually on a hill or tower) that can be seen from a distance.
Synonym: beacon fire.
7. a tower with a light that gives warning of shoals to passing ships;
Synonyms: lighthouse, beacon light, pharos.
8. a pole used as a standard or ensign set on the tops of mountains as a call to the people to assemble themselves for
some great national purpose (Isa 30:17).
Etymology: heb. "toren".
9. a mast (Isa 33:23, Ezek 27:5);
10. a radio station that broadcasts a directional signal for navigational purposes.
Synonym: radio beacon.
11. to give light to, as a beacon; to light up; to illumine.
Example:
It beacons the darkness of heaven.
12. to furnish with a beacon or beacons;
13. to shine like a beacon;
14. to guide with a beacon
bean
(usu. in negatives) the smallest possible amount of money
Examples:
I haven't a bean, so I can't pay you.
It's not worth a bean.
bean counter

• bean
• counter

An accountant; someone who monitors the flow of money very carefully.
Example:
We wanted to buy some new furniture for the office but the bean counters wouldn't let us.
Etymology:
This phrase comes from a comedy routine that was popular in New York in the 1880s. In the routine, a man would order some pork and beans and then would yell "And don't stop to count the beans!" The idea is that it is not necessary to count each and every bean, and that anyone who does is a little bit crazy - and cheap.

bear

• bull
• born
• bore
• borne

1. To support or sustain; to hold up; to support or hold in a certain manner.
Examples:
1) She holds her head high.
2) He held himself upright. Synonyms: hold, carry 2. To support and remove or carry; to convey; move while holding up or supporting.
Example:
I'll bear your logs the while. 3. (said of persons) To conduct; to bring.
Example:
(obs.) Bear them to my house. 4. To possess and use, as power; to exercise.
Example:
Every man should bear rule in his own house. 5. To sustain; to have on (written or inscribed, or as a mark).
Example:
The tablet bears this inscription. 6. To possess or carry, as a mark of authority or distinction;
to wear (as, to bear a sword, badge, or name); have rightfully; of rights, titles, and offices.
Examples:
1) She bears the title of Duchess.
2) He held the governorship for almost a decade. Synonym: hold 7. To possess mentally; to carry or hold in the mind; to entertain.
Example:
To harbor the ancient grudge i bear him. 8. To endure; to tolerate; to undergo; to suffer; to put up with something or somebody unpleasant; to admit or be capable of (i.e., to suffer or sustain without violence, injury, or change).
Examples:
1) I cannot bear his constant criticism.
2) Should such a man, too fond to rule alone, bear, like the Turk, no brother near the throne. (A. Pope)
3) In all criminal cases the most favorable interpretation should be put on words that they can possibly bear. Synonyms:
digest, endure, stick out, stomach, stand, tolerate, support, brook, abide, suffer, put up. 9. To gain or win.
Example:
(obs.) Some think to bear it by speaking a great word. 10. To sustain, or be answerable for, as blame, expense, responsibility, etc.; to take on as one's own the expenses or debts of another person.
Example:
He shall bear their iniquities.
Synonyms: take over, accept, assume 11. To render or give; to bring forward. 12. To carry on, or maintain; to have; contain or hold; have within.
Example:
This can bears water. Synonyms: hold, carry, contain 13. To manage, wield, or direct; hence: to behave in a certain manner; to conduct.
Examples:
1) Hath he borne himself penitently in prison? (W. Shakespeare, "Measure for Measure")
2) She carried herself well. Synonyms: behave, acquit, deport, conduct, comport, carry 14. To afford; to be to; to supply with.
Example:
His faithful dog shall bear him company. Synonym: turn out 15. To bring forth or produce; to yield; to bring forth
Examples:
1) The apple tree bore delicious apples this year.
2) How much does this savings certificate bear annually? Synonyms: yield, pay Note. In the passive form of this verb, the best modern usage restricts the past participle "born" to the sense of "brought forth", while "borne" is used in the other senses of the word. In the active form, "borne" alone is used as the past participle.
16. To be pregnant with.
Example:
She is bearing his child. Synonyms: have a bun in the oven, carry, gestate, expect
17. To give birth.
My wife had twins yesterday! Synonyms: give birth
18. To have on one's person.
Example:
He bore a red ribbon. Synonym: wear
Etymology:
(verb) O.E. "beran" - "bear, bring, wear", from P.Gmc. "beranan" (cf. O.H.G. "beran", O.N. "bera", Goth. "bairan" = "to carry"), from PIE root "bher-" meaning both "give birth" (though only Eng. and Ger. strongly retain this sense) and "carry a burden, bring" (cf. Gk. "phery" - "I carry," L. "ferre" - "to carry," O.Ir. "beru/berim" - "I catch, I bring forth," Skt. "bharati" - "carries," O.C.S. "bnrati" - "to take"). Many senses are from notion of "move onward by pressure." O.E. past tense "b?r" became M.E. "bare"; alternative "bore" began to appear c.1400, but "bare" remained the literary form till after 1600. Past participle distinction of "borne" for "carried" and "born" for "given birth" is 1775. "Bearing" = "way of carrying oneself" is in M.E.
19. Large mammal of the family Ursidae, closely related to the dog (family Canidae) and raccoon (Procyonidae).
20. (stock exchange) An investor who believes a stock or the overall market will decline. A bear market is a prolonged period of falling stock prices, usually by 20% or more.
Example:
A bear sells shares, sometimes shares he doesn't own, hoping to buy them back later at a lower price (in the jargon, he is "short" of the necessary shares), so is hoping for a fall in the market price and may be considered a pessimist
Related word: bull.
Symbolic image of Russia.
Synonym: Russian bear.
21. Uncouth person.
22. (dream symbol) Digestive system, colon.
23. (aviation) A backseat pilot or navigator in a two-seat tandem aircraft.
Etymology:
(noun) O.E. "bera" = "bear," from P.Gmc. "beron" = "the brown one". Both Gk. "arktos" and L. "ursus" retain the PIE root word for "bear" ("rtko"), but it has been ritually replaced in the northern branches because of hunters' taboo on names of wild animals (cf. the Ir. equivalent "the good calf," Welsh "honey-pig," Lith. "the licker," Rus. "medved" - "honey-eater"). Others connect the Gmc. word with L. "ferus" - "wild," as if it meant "the wild animal (par excellence) of the northern woods." Symbolic of Russia since 1794. Used of uncouth persons since 1579. Meaning "speculator for a fall" is 1709 shortening of "bearskin jobber", from phrase "sell the bearskin" in proverb "sell the bearskin before one has caught the bear", i.e. "one who sells stock for future delivery, expecting that meanwhile prices will fall"; so, don't assume your success is assured until it actually happens, don't be over-optimistic. A "bear-skin jobber" sold shares he didn't own, in the hope that their price would fall and that he would be able to "catch his bear" by buying them more cheaply in the market before he had to deliver them.
beastly
very unpleasant; nasty
Examples:
He is a beastly person, I don't want even to hear about him.
I've had a beastly cold.
beat

• pooped
• poop
• lame

1. Fatigued, exhausted, very tired.
Example: Man, I'm beat! I need to lie down in bed for a few hours.
Etymology: When you 'beat' something, you hit it repeatedly. So if something has been 'beaten', it is damaged and not as lively as it once was. If you say "I'm beat", it means that you feel as though you have beaten, and thus are in need of some rest.
Synonym: pooped.
2. Boring, lame (in a cultural sense).
Example: Heavy metal is kind of beat now - I'm more into rap.
Synonym: lame.

beat a dead horse

• beat
• dead
• horse

To keep talking about something after everything useful has already been said; to discuss a topic after it has been completely exhausted; to pursue a useless goal; to continue fighting a battle which has been lost; to keep arguing a point which has already been decided.
Examples:
1) We've already decided what we're going to do, so let's not talk about it anymore -- there's no reason to beat a dead horse. 2) Marty kept beating a dead horse in the sales meeting, and it kept us there an extra half hour.
3) He tried to convince his sister, but he was beating a dead horse.
Etymology:
A dead horse cannot be brought back to life, even if you beat it. So if you are 'beating a dead horse', you are wasting your time.
This saying goes back to the ancient Roman playwright Plautus who used it in 195 B.C. in one of his plays. The dramatic performance was of trying to whip a dead horse to get up and carry the load it was supposed to be moving. This action was shown to accomplish nothing. Today we say that anyone pursuing an issue that is already settled is "beating a dead horse."

beat one's brains out

• beat one's brains
• beat one's brain out
• beat one's brain
• beat out
• brains
• brain
• beat

to try very hard to understand something.
Example:
Can you help me with this problem? I've been beating my brains out with it, but I just can't solve it.
beat one's swords into plowshares

• beat swords into plowshares
• beat swords
• plowshares
• beat into
• beat
• swords
• plowshare
• sword

to stop fighting and turn your attention toward peaceful activities.
Example:
The prime minister would like them to beat their swords into plowshares and abandon all
plans for war.
Etymology:
This is another of the many famous sayings that come from the Bible. In Isaiah 2:4 there appears the following sentence: "And they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more." Swords and spears represent weapons of war. Plowshares and pruning hooks represent farming tools, which are symbols for all peaceful activities. So when a modern nation "beats its swords into plowshares," it could be manufacturing passenger planes instead of bombers, of VCRs instead of military radar systems.

beat the band

• beat
• band

with much noise, excitement, or commotion; very much, very fast; outgoing all others.
Example:
When my sister told us that she was marrying Malcolm, everyone cheered to beat the band.
Etymology:
This saying started in the late 1800s in Britain and then traveled across the Atlantic Ocean to the United States. One explanation of its origin is that since a band is usually loud, exciting, and colorful, anything that "beats the band" must be louder, more exciting, and more colorful. The other explanation is that people sometimes run ahead of a marching band to beat it to a certain spot. This idiom can also be used to express amazement for any astonishing achievement, as in "She can drive the tractor and she's only eight years old. If that doesn't beat the band!"
beau ideal

• beau
• ideal
• beau ideals
• ideals

[boh-ay-DEEL]
plural: beau ideals
A perfect or an idealized type or model.
Examples:
1) Their commentaries inspired generations of schoolboys to pen compositions in praise of the Spartan lad who flinched not as the fox gnawed his vitals, and shaped the American beau ideal of the "strong silent type." (Florence King, "Oh, Sparta!" National Review, September 12, 1994)
2) To the populace, of course, Hindenburg remains the national hero and beau ideal; nay, almost the national Messiah. (H.L. Mencken, "Ludendorff," The Atlantic, June 1917)
Etymology:
"Beau ideal" is from the French "beau id?al" - "ideal beauty."

beauty is in the eye of the beholder

• beauty
• eye
• beholder

There is no standard for beauty, so what one person likes or sees in someone or something is not necessarily what others see; different people have different opinions.
Example:
Lenny thinks his dog's haircut is cool. I guess beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
Etymology:
Many writers in the past have stated the idea that what one person thinks is ugly, another person may think is beautiful. The "eye" is really the mind, thoughts, feelings, and emotions of the "beholder", or the person who is looking at the person or thing.
bed of roses

• bowl of cherries
• a bowl of cherries
• a bed of roses
• bed
• roses
• rose
• bowl
• cherries
• cherry

a wonderful, pleasant situation or position; an easy, comfortable life.
Example: Compared with my old school, this one is a bed of roses.
Etymology:
English poets have used this phrase for centuries. Roses are such lovely, sweet-smelling, soft-petaled flowers that a bed of them suggests a lovely, sweet, and soft condition. The meaning was stretched to mean any easy and comfortable situation in life. However, if you really think about it, roses have thorns and a real bed of roses would probably be anything but comfortable.
Synonym: bowl of cherries.

bedizen

• distaff

[bih-DY-zuhn, bih-DYE-zen]
To dress or adorn gaudily, in gaudy manner.
Examples:
1) At 18, he attended a party "frizzled, powdered and curled, in radiant pink satin, with waistcoat bedizened with gems of pink paste and a mosaic of colored foils and a hat blazing with 5,000 metallic beads," according to Michael Battersberry in "Fashion, The Mirror of History". (Donna Larcen, "Details, Details: Everything Old Is New Again", St. Louis Post-Dispatch, May 19, 1994)
2) ...Ford's 2001-model F-150 SuperCrew "Harley-Davidson" model. This special edition pickup truck is bedizened with enough chrome, leather, and H-D logos to bring a RUBbie (Rich Urban Biker) weeping to his knees. ("Summer Autos 2001", Newsday, May 19, 2001)
3) Adorned by minarets and spires and bedizened by more than a million lights, Coney Island embodied what has been called the 'architecture of exhilaration.' (Blaine Harden, "New York Times", August 28, 1999)
Etymology, related words:
"Bedizen" doesn't have the flashy history - its roots lie in the rather quiet art of spinning thread. In times past, the spinning process began with the placement of fibers (such as flax) on an implement called a "distaff"; the fibers were then drawn out from the distaff and twisted into thread. "Bedizen" is composed of the prefix "be-" ("completely; thoroughly; excessively") + "dizen", an archaic word meaning "to deck out in fine clothes and ornaments", from Middle Dutch "disen" - "to dress (a distaff) with flax ready for spinning", from Middle Low German "dise" - "the bunch of flax placed on a distaff". The spelling of "disen" eventually became "dizen," and its meaning expanded to cover the "dressing up" of things other than distaffs. In the mid-17th century, English speakers began using "bedizen" with the same meaning.
bee in one's bonnet

• have bee in one's bonnet
• have bats in one's belfry
• bats in one's belfry
• bee
• bonnet
• bats
• belfry
• bat

a crazy idea; on obsession with an idea.
Example:
Mr. Davis thinks he can teach us the trombone. He must have a bee in his bonnet.
Etymology:
This 16th-century expression was originally "to have a head full of bees," but it changed to "bee in one's bonnet" in Robert Herrick's "Mad Maid's Song", a poem written in 1648. It sounds better this way because of alliteration - both words beginning with the same letter. If you have a crazy idea and can't talk about anything else, it's like having a bee stuck in your hat.
Synoym: bats in one's belfry.
bee's knees

• bee's knee
• bee
• knees
• knee
• dog's bollocks
• dog's bollock
• dog
• bollock
• bollocks

(slang) Person or thing that is wonderful; marvelous person or thing; the greatest; someone to admire.
History:
It is sometimes explained as being from an Italian-American way of saying "business", or that it is properly "Bs and Es", an abbreviation for "be-alls and end-alls".
Both are wrong. "Bee's knees" is actually one of a set of nonsense catchphrases from 1920s America, the period of the flappers. At that time, one might have heard such curious concoctions as "cat's miaow", "elephant's adenoids", "tiger's spots", "bullfrog's beard", "elephant's instep", "caterpillar's kimono", "turtle's neck", "duck's quack", "gnat's elbows", "monkey's eyebrows", "oyster's earrings", "snake's hips", "kipper's knickers", "elephant's manicure", "clam's garter", "eel's ankle", "leopard's stripes", "tadpole's teddies", "sardine's whiskers", "pig's wings", "bullfrog's beard", "canary's tusks", "cuckoo's chin" and "butterfly's book".
None of these made much sense - but then, slang fashions often don't - and their only common feature was the comparison of something of excellent quality to a part of an animal with, if possible, a bit of alliteration thrown in. Another example was "cat's whiskers", which is sometimes said to have been the first of the bunch to arise, from the cat's whisker that was the adjustable wire in early radio crystal sets.
However, "cat's miaow" and "cat's pyjamas" (an exception to the anatomical rule, referring to the then new fashion of wearing pyjamas at night) are both recorded slightly earlier, in about 1921. The first appearance of "bee's knees" in print was found by Barry Popik in a flapper's dictionary in the "Appleton Post-Crescent" of Appleton, Missouri of April 28, 1922, glossed as meaning "peachy, very nice". Clearly, by then it must already have been well established.
It was a short-lived, frivolous slang fashion and only a very few such expressions have survived, of which "bee's knees" is perhaps the best known. A British example from the same period is "dog's bollocks". This, too, indicates something excellent, admirable or first-rate. Eric Partridge suggests it arose as a term for the printer's mark of a colon followed by a dash. This fits the pattern and period of the others, but its first sense suggests it came out of a different tradition. Certainly, it only became a general slang term much later.

beefalo

• cattalo

A cross between a male bison and a cow; an animal developed by breeding (American) buffalo with beef cattle.
Example:
The beefalo yields leaner beef than conventional breeds.
Synonym: cattalo
Etymology:
"Beefalo" = "beef" + "buffalo".

beg the question

• beg
• question
• hedge
• equivocate
• tergiversate
• hem and haw
• hem
• haw
• prompt the question
• force smb. to ask
• prompt
• ask

1. (In an argument) To assume the truth of something which is in fact a part of what is still to be proved.
Example:
The original sense of "to beg the question" is of a logical fallacy, of taking for granted or assuming the thing that you are setting out to prove.
2. To avoid giving an answer on a tricky matter; to dodge an awkward subject.
Synonyms:
hedge, equivocate, tergiversate, hem and haw
3. To raise the question.
Example:
Some definitions of mental illness beg the question of what constitutes normal behaviour. (Payne, S and Brown, M. "Introduction to social administration in Britain". - London: Unwin Hyman Ltd, 1990)
Synonyms:
prompt the question; force one to ask
Etymology:
The "fallacy" meaning of the phrase was described by Aristotle in his book on logic in about 350BC. His Greek name for it was turned into Latin as "petitio principii" and then into English in 1581 as "beg the question". Most of our problems arise because the person who translated it made a hash of it. The Latin might better be translated as "laying claim to the principle", a term in medieval logic denoting the fallacy of assuming as a given the very conclusion that one is trying to reach by logical argument.
The meaning "to avoid the question" is common and most authorities agree it is now not a colloquialism, but a part of standard English.
Over time, "beg" has also come to mean "pose" or "addresses" the question. To highlight some people's unhappiness with this trend, the "Canadian Oxford" devotes several paragraphs to what it clearly identifies as an expanded but "disputed" definition. The lexicographers resist weighing in with a ruling - unsurprising, since dictionaries prefer description to proscription nowadays. But the "1997 Oxford Guide to Canadian English Usage" doesn't hesitate to offer advice: "In Canadian newspapers, 'begs the question' almost always means 'raises the question' or 'brings up the issue.' Although this usage is very common, it should probably be avoided because it is completely at odds with the formal meaning of the expression and constantly criticized by commentators."

behemoth
[bih-HEE-muth]
1. (Often capitalized) A mighty animal described in Job 40:15-24 as an example of the power of God.
2. Something of monstrous size, power, or appearance.
Example:
Suddenly a behemoth of a truck, honking madly and going at least 80 mph, bore down on me from out of the blue.
History:
The original "behemoth" was biblical; it designated a mysterious river-dwelling beast in the Book of Job. Based on that description, scholars have concluded that the biblical behemoth was probably inspired by a hippopotamus, but details about the creature's exact nature were vague. The word first passed from the Hebrew into Late Latin, where, according to English poet and monk John Lydgate, writing in 1430, it "playne expresse[d] a beast rude full of cursednesse." In English, "behemoth" was eventually applied more generally to anything large and powerful.

behind bars

• be behind bars
• behind
• bars
• bar
• up the river
• in the slammer
• under glass
• river
• slammer
• glass
• be up the river
• be in the slammer
• be under glass

In prison or jail; incarcerated.
Examples:
1) My brother Charlie tried to rob a bank, but the cops caught him and now he's behind bars. 2) I can't wait until they catch the killer and put him behind bars.
Etymology:
Prison inmates are locked behind metal bars which prevent their escape. Synonyms: up the river, in the slammer, under glass

behind the eight ball

• be behind the eight ball
• in a pretty kettle of fish
• up the creek without a paddle
• up the creek
• without a paddle
• in a pickle
• in the dog house
• in hot water
• behind
• the eight ball
• eight ball
• eight
• ball
• pretty kettle of fish
• pretty
• kettle of fish
• kettle
• fish
• creek
• pickle
• dog house
• dog
• house
• hot water
• paddle

In a bad situation, in a losing / difficult position with little hope of winning; in trouble or out of luck.
Examples:
1) I'm really behind the eight ball at work. I have too much work to do but we can't afford to hire anyone to help out.
2) My father caught me napping in the hammock instead of mowing the lawn. I'm really behind the eight ball now.
Etymology:
This American idiom from the early 1900s comes from billiards (or pool).
In the game
kellypool you have to hit numbered balls into pockets of a billiard table in numerical
order, except for ball number eight, which is to be pocketed last. However, when the cue (white) ball is behind the eight (black) ball, a player usually has no shot. That's a bad
position to be in. Today we say that anyone "behind the eight ball" is experiencing a lot
of bad luck.
Synonyms:
in a pretty kettle of fish, up the creek (without a paddle), in a pickle, in the dog house, in hot water
beholden
[bih-HOHL-duhn]
Obliged; bound in gratitude; indebted.
Examples:
1) Kate was quite fond of him and knew he was grateful to her for all the help and hospitality she and Oliver had given him during his period of gloom and puzzlement after his wife's defection, but she did not want him to feel beholden to her. (Mary Sheepshanks, "Picking Up the Pieces")
2) The likely new government, which draws only a negligible level of support from rural areas, will be much less beholden to the farming interests than any government in the past two decades. ("Reforming The EU Budget," Irish Times, October 8, 1998)
3) Peter did not intend to be beholden to any of his relatives unless they proved their worth. (Lindsey Hughes, "Russia in the Age of Peter the Great")
Etymology:
"Beholden" is derived from Old English "behealden" ("to hold firmly"), from "be-" (intensive prefix) + "healden" ("to hold").

belfry

• campanile
• bats in the belfry
• bat in the belfry
• bats
• bat

1. Bell tower of a church, either attached to a structure or freestanding.
Synonym: campanile
2. The section of such a tower where bells hang; a room (often at the top of a tower) where bells are hung.
3. The timberwork that supports the bells; the framing on which a bell is suspended.
4. (mil. antiq.) A movable tower erected by besiegers for purposes of attack and defense.
5. A head.
Examples:
1) But they are happy in buildings, too; not simply in the traditional belfry, but also (if left alone) in the lofts of modern houses. (Tudge, Colin. "Global ecology". - London: Natural History Museum Publications, 1991)
2) It was three o'clock; the church bell tolled as I passed under the belfry: the charm of the hour lay in its approaching dimness, in the low-gliding and pale-beaming sun. (Charlotte Bronte, Jane Eyre) History, related words and expressions, examples:
Surprisingly, "belfry" does not come from "bell," and early belfries did not contain bells at all. "Belfry" comes from "berfrey," from "berfrei", an Old French word of Germanic origin, a medieval term which originally denoted a siege tower, a wooden construction built to shelter attackers as they assaulted the walls of a city. The structure could be rolled up to a fortification wall so that warriors hidden inside could storm the battlements. Over time, the term was applied to other types of shelters and towers, many of which had bells in them. The word acquired its "-l-" by folk etymology, thanks to the belief that "belfry" is somehow connected etymologically with "bell". Through association, people began spelling "berfrey" as "bellfrey," then as "belfrey" and later "belfry." On a more metaphorical note, someone who has "bats in the belfry" is crazy or eccentric. This phrase is responsible for the use of "bats" for "crazy" ("Are you completely bats?") and the occasional use of "belfry" for "head" ("He's not quite right in the belfry").
bell the cat

• bell
• cat

To do the impossible. It is easily suggested, but once suggested, no one will volunteer to do it.
Etymology: From the fable by Aesop "Belling the Cat"
Long ago, the mice had a general council to consider what measures they could take to outwit their common enemy, the Cat. Some said this, and some said that; but at last a young mouse got up and said he had a proposal to make, which he thought would meet the case. "You will all agree," said he, "that our chief danger consists in the sly and treacherous manner in which the enemy approaches us. Now, if we could receive some signal of her approach, we could easily escape from her. I venture, therefore, to propose that a small bell be procured, and attached by a ribbon round the neck of the Cat. By this means we should always know when she was about, and could easily retire while she was in the neighbourhood." This proposal met with general applause, until an old mouse got up and said: "That is all very well, but who is to bell the Cat?" The mice looked at one another and nobody spoke. Then the old mouse said, "IT IS EASY TO PROPOSE IMPOSSIBLE REMEDIES."
belladonna

• atropa belladonna
• atropa
• belladonna
• deadly nightshade
• deadly
• nightshade

1. A poisonous plant with dark purple berries; a perennial eurasian herb with reddish bell-shaped flowers and shining black berries; extensively grown in united states; roots and leaves yield atropine.
Synonyms: atropa belladonna, deadly nightshade
2. An alkaloidal extract or tincture of the poisonous belladonna herb that is used medicinally.
Example:
The whole plant and fruit of belladonna are very poisonous, and the root and leaves are used as powerful medicinal agents.
Etymology:
The word literally means "fine lady" in Italian: "bella" ("beautiful") + "donna" ("lady"). Belladonna was once used as a cosmetic because small doses cause the pupils to dilate, thus making the lady's eyes sparkle.

belle epoque

• belle
• epoque

[BEL-ay-POK]
1. A period of high artistic or cultural development; especially: such a period in France around the end of the 19th century.
2. Another name for the Edwardian period.
Example:
Nob Hill remains a symbol of San Francisco's belle epoque, those golden days of the late 1890s when the city was awash in money, mansions, and elegance.
History:
In the years before World War I, France experienced a period of economic growth that produced a wealth of artistic and cultural developments. That era has been described as excessive, glittering, gaudy, and extravagant, but the tumultuous days of war that followed it inspired the French to call that productive period "la belle epoque" - literally, "the beautiful age." By the mid-1950s, the term "belle epoque" had found its way into English, where it came to be used to refer not only to the glory days of late 19th-century France, but to any similarly luxurious period. It is now used to more elegantly convey the sentiments of another nostalgic expression, "the good old days."

bells and whistles

• all the bells and whistles
• bells
• whistles
• bell
• whistle
• frills
• extras
• frill
• extra

Impressive accessories, especially flashy, high-technology features and frills, which may sometimes to be more decorative than necessary.
Examples:
1) My father bought a new computer with all the bells and whistles: CD-ROM, modem, color printer, full multimedia. I think it even makes toast.
2) I like the original model, without all the bells and whistles the second version has.
3) A train would come into town with all the bells and whistles sounding to attract attention.
Etymology:
'Bells' and 'whistles' make noise and attract attention, but they are not a necessary part of most things. This phrase came into being in the late 1800's with the advent of the railroad. But the expression became especially popular with the development of many kinds of new electronic and computerized equipment. The "bells and whistles" represent all sorts of super high-tech features that you don't really need in a basic model but which make a product more fun to use (and more expensive).
NB: "bells and whistles" don't have to make any sounds. Synonyms: all the bells and whistles; frills, extras.

bellwether
[BEL-WEH-ther] ("th" as in "this")
1. One that takes the lead or initiative; a leader of a movement or activity.
2. An indicator of trends.
Examples:
1) Always the fashion bellwether of the class, Mike started wearing khaki pants to school while other boys were still wearing jeans.
2) Raised to believe they were among their generation's best and brightest, my class can be seen as a bellwether for a generation caught without a compass on the cutting edge of uncharted territory. (Elizabeth Fishel, "Reunion: The Girls We Used to Be, the Women We Became")
3) Before that election, Maine's proud citizens had fancied their state to be a sort of bellwether, a notion embodied in the saying "As Maine goes, so goes the nation." (Robert Shogan, "The Fate of the Union")
Etymology:
We usually think of sheep more as followers than leaders, but in a flock one sheep must lead the way. Long ago, it was common practice for shepherds to hang a bell around the neck of one sheep in their flock, thereby designating it the lead sheep. This animal was called the "bellwether", a word formed by a combination of the Middle English words "belle" (meaning "bell") and "wether" (a noun that refers to a male sheep that has been castrated). It eventually followed that "bellwether" would come to refer to someone who takes initiative or who actively establishes a trend that is taken up by others. This usage first appeared in English in the 13th century.
bemuse

• bemused

[bih-MYOOZ]
1. To make confused.
Synonyms: puzzle, bewilder.
2. To occupy the attention of ...
Synonyms: distract, absorb.
3. To cause to have feelings of wry or tolerant amusement.
Example:
[The boat's captain] is too polite to comment, but he has noted, faintly bemused, his passenger's suede shoes. (Michael Kenyon, "Gourmet", May 1990)
History:
In 1735, British poet Alexander Pope lamented, in rhyme, being besieged by "a parson much bemus'd in beer". The cleric in question was apparently one of a horde of would-be poets who plagued Pope with requests that he read their verses. Pope meant the parson had found his muse - his inspiration - in beer. That use of "bemus'd" harks back to a 1705 letter in which Pope wrote of "Poets . . . irrecoverably Be-mus'd". In both letter and poem, Pope used "bemused" to refer to being inspired by or devoted to one of the Muses, the Greek sister goddesses of art, music, and literature. The lexicographers who followed him, however, interpreted "bemus'd in beer" as meaning "left confused by beer," and their confusion gave rise to one modern sense of "bemused."

bend over backwards

• bend over
• backwards
• bend
• over backwards
• go all-out
• go
• all-out
• over
• backward

To try very hard to help someone; to make every effort possible.
Examples:
1) When they were merging, AOL and Time Warner bent over backwards to satisfy the Security and Exchange Commission. 2) At PEAK English, the teachers bend over backwards to help you improve your language skills.
Etymology: It is very difficult to bend the human body backwards. Doing so requires great strength and motivation, and if someone 'bends over backwards' for you, then they must be very eager to please you.
Synonym: go all-out

bender
An episode of heavy drinking; a period of any kind of unusually intense behavior. Example:
After losing my job, I was so depressed that I went on a three day bender.
Etymology:
Comes from the 19th century sense of the word 'bender', which was used for anything great or spectacular.

benedict
[BEN-uh-dikt]
A newly married man who has long been a bachelor.
Example:
Tabloid reporters never tire of asking celebrity benedicts what they think of married life.
History, more meanings:
"Benedick" is the chief male character in Shakespeare's play "Much Ado About Nothing". Throughout the play, both Benedick and his female counterpart Beatrice exchange barbed comments and profess to detest the very idea of marriage, but the story eventually culminates in their marriage to each other. As a result, Benedick's name came to be applied to men who marry later in life. The spelling was changed to "benedict," possibly by association with a use of "benedict" meaning "bachelor" (although the evidence for this use is scant). Some early 20th-century usage commentators regarded the respelling as incorrect with regards to the etymology, but "benedict" has become the established spelling nevertheless.
On the other hand, Benedict, from the Latin for "blessed", is the name of many notable men. The most prominent at the beginning of the 21st century is Pope Benedict XVI, who chose this name for himself after his election to the papacy. In history the most renowned is Saint Benedict of Nursia (Italy, fl. 6th century), the founder of western monasticism, who wrote a Rule for monastic living for the monastery he had founded at Monte Cassino that was subsequently adopted by monastic communities throughout the continent and beyond, and today continues to be followed in the communities of the Benedictine Order worldwide.
benefaction

• donation
• gift
• present

[BEN-uh-fak-shuhn; ben-uh-FAK-shuhn]
1. The act of conferring a benefit.
2. A benefit conferred; especially, a charitable donation.
Synonyms: donation, gift, present.
Examples:
1) Rockefeller's taxable income was then $33,000,000 and that his total fortune was probably more than $800,000,000. At that time he had distributed about $500,000,000 in public benefactions. ("Financier's Fortune in Oil Amassed in Industrial Era of 'Rugged Individualism,'" New York Times, May 24, 1937)
2) It may be, as some social psychologists argue, that the competitive urge to gain more is in time replaced by an equally competitive urge to win fame and favor through public benefactions. (Robin W. Winks, Laurance S. Rockefeller: Catalyst for Conservation)
Etymology:
"Benefaction" is from Late Latin "benefactio", from Latin "benefacere" ("to do well, to do good to"), from "bene" ("well") + "facere" ("to do").

beneficence

• beneficent

[buh-NEFF-i-suhns]
1. The practice of doing good; active goodness, kindness, or charity.
2. A charitable gift or act.
Examples:
1) Lord Jeffrey told Dickens that it ["A Christmas Carol"] had "prompted more positive acts of beneficence than can be traced to all the pulpits and confessionals in Christendom since Christmas 1842." (Roger Highfield, "The Physics of Christmas")
2) From my grandfather Verus I learned good morals and the government of my temper. From the reputation and remembrance of my father, modesty and a manly character. From my mother, piety and beneficence and abstinence. (Marcus Aurelius, "Meditations")
3) She had disseminated around her what seemed an involuntary aura of beneficence and goodwill. (John Bayley, "Elegy for Iris")
Etymology, related words:
"Beneficence" is from Latin "beneficentia", from "beneficus" ("kind, generous, obliging"), from "bene" ("well") from "bonus" ("good") + "facere" ("to do"). The adjective form is "beneficent".

benignant
[bih-NIG-nuhnt]
1. Kind; gracious.
2. Beneficial; favorable.
Examples:
1) After the captain and ladies had sat down, the autocratic steward rang a second bell, and with a majestic wave of the hand, and a calm, benignant smile, signified his pleasure that we should sit down. (Sir Henry Stanley, "Grand tours - Mind your manners at the captain's table," Independent, August 18, 2002)
2) At the meeting it was strange to see, amidst the peaceful, benignant faces, this woe-begone old man, with his thick white hair and his deeply furrowed placid cheeks, looking wistfully from one to the other, and listening anxiously, hoping some day to hear the words which should bring peace to his soul. (Alexander L. Kielland, "Skipper Worse")
3) Human beings . . . are forever ascribing malignant or benignant motives even to inanimate forces such as the weather, volcanoes, and internal-combustion engines. (Stephen Budiansky, "The Truth About Dogs," The Atlantic, July 1999)
Etymology:
"Benignant" comes from the present participle of Late Latin "benignare", from Latin "benignus" ("kind, friendly").

benison
[BEN-uh-suhn; -zuhn]
Blessing; benediction.
Examples:
1) In the beginning, Gibran's small estate was worth some $50,000, benison enough for a village of ten thousand souls. (Stefan Kanfer, "But is it not strange that elephants will yield - and that The Prophet is still popular?" New York Times, June 25, 1972)
2) Yet to be with him was a benison, a curiously exhilarating and anarchic experience, as the lightning celerity of his thought processes took you on a kind of helter-skelter ride of surreal non-sequiturs, sudden accesses of emotion and ribald asides, made all the more bizarre for being uttered in those honeyed tones by the impeccably elegant gent before you. (Simon Callow, "A life full of frolics," The Guardian, May 19, 2001)
Etymology:
"Benison" comes from Old French "beneison", from Latin "benedictio", from "benedicere" ("to bless"), from "bene" ("well") + "dicere" ("to say").

bereft

• bereave
• bereafian

[bih-REFT]
1. Deprived or robbed of the possession or use of something.
2. Lacking something needed, wanted, or expected.
3. Bereaved.
Example:
With Emilia gone, I am bereft of all hope and joy," lamented William.
History, related words, more examples:
In Old English, the verb "bereafian" meant "to plunder or rob." The modern equivalent (and descendant) of "bereafian" is "bereave," a verb that implies that you have robbed or stripped someone of something, often suddenly and unexpectedly (and sometimes by force). "Bereft" comes from the past participle of "bereave," and it sometimes still functions as a participle, as in Shakespeare's "The Merchant of Venice", where Bassanio tells Portia, "Madam, you have bereft me of all words." But by Shakespeare's day "bereft" was also being used as an adjective, as the Bard himself used it in "The Taming of the Shrew" when a newly obedient and docile Katharina declares, "A woman mov'd is like a fountain troubled - muddy, ... thick, bereft of beauty."
besot
1. infatuate
2. to make dull or stupid; (esp.) to muddle with drunkenness
Example:
"The views besot me.... Fields of hay, wheat, and sunflowers, olive groves, and patches of forest spread out in every direction." (David Leavitt, "Travel & Leisure", May 2000)
Etymology:
"Besot" developed from a combination of the prefix "be-" ("to cause to be") and "sot", a now archaic verb meaning "to cause to appear foolish or stupid". "Sot" in turn comes from the Middle English "sott", a noun meaning "fool". The first known use of "besot" is found in a poem by George Turberville, published in 1567. In the poem the narrator describes how he gazed at a beautiful stranger "till use of sense was fled". He then proceeds to compare himself to Aegisthus of Greek legend, the lover of Clytemnestra while Agamemnon was away at war, writing: "What forced the Fool to love / his beastly idle life / was cause that he besotted was / of Agamemnon's Wife."

bete noire

• bete
• noire
• bugbear

[bet-NWAHR]
Something or someone particularly detested or avoided; person or thing that is hated or disliked.
Synonym: bugbear.
Examples:
1) Even more regrettable, as far as Dame Edna is concerned, is the presence of her old bete noire, the extravagantly disgusting Sir Les Patterson. ("The Dame's New Man," Daily Telegraph, April 18, 1998)
2) Never an exceptional student, Andrews somehow managed to navigate the academy's rigorous courses with satisfactory grades, though all forms of mathematics were agonizing to him, remaining what he called his "bete noire" throughout life. (Charles Gallenkamp, "Dragon Hunter: Roy Chapman Andrews and the Central Asiatic Expeditions")
Etymology:
"Bete noire" is French for "black beast."

betimes
[bih-TYMZ]
1. Early; in good time; before it is late.
2. At times; on occasion.
3. (Archaic) Soon; in a short time.
Examples:
1) But it takes a piece of political theatre, like yesterday's release of the Iraq dossier, to get us out of bed betimes. (Andrew Marr, "I couldn't have a lie-in because of the Iraq dossier," Daily Telegraph, September 25, 2002)
2) It looks like it's trying to clear this morning, though waves of drizzle betimes pass through. (Will Cook, "Macklin's Cross," Irish America, February 1, 2004)
3) Some of them were poets or novelists first and critics only betimes. (Denis Donoghue, "The Practice of Reading")
Etymology:
"Betimes" is from Middle English "bitimes", from "bi" ("by") + "time" ("time").

better half

• one's better half
• better
• half

either partner in marriage.
Example:
I'm not making a decision until I check with my better half.
Etymology:
Puritans were English Protestants in the 16th and 17th centuries who favored
strict religious discipline. They said that each person was made up of two halves, a body
and a soul, and that the soul was the better half because it was the spiritual side. Sir
Philip Sidney, and English writer, said that a marriage was made up of two halves, and
that the better half was the better spouse. Today when the phrase "better half" is used,
it almost always means someone's wife, although there's no reason why can't use the term to describe her husband. In either case, "better half" is a compliment.
between a rock and a hard place

• be between a rock and a hard place
• between the devil and the deep blue sea
• be between the devil and the deep blue sea
• between
• rock
• hard place
• hard
• place

being in a very tight spot and faced with a difficult decision
Example:
It's a tough choice between getting to the big game on time or waiting for Mr. Smith to call. I'm stuck between a rock and a hard place.
Etymology:
In the American saying from the early 20th century, you can picture someone actually squeezed between a rock and a hard place. He or she has to turn one way or the
other, but neither way is very pleasant. A similar expression from an earlier time is "between the devil and the deep blue sea".
Synonym:
between the devil and the deep blue sea
between the devil and the deep blue sea

• between a rock and a hard place
• be between a rock and a hard place
• be between the devil and the deep blue sea
• between
• devil
• deep
• blue
• sea

between two great dangers and not knowing what to do; in a very difficult position.
Example:
Glenn had to choose between confessing that he hadn't studied or trying to fake it. He was between the devil and the deep blue sea.
Etymology:
In the early 17th century the heavy plank fastened to the side of a vessel as a support for guns was called the devil. Sometimes a sailor had to go out onto this plank to
do repairs to the boat. In heavy seas he would be in great danger of falling overboard and drowning because he was between "the devil and the deep blue sea". Over the centuries the meaning of this expression expanded to include being between two equally difficult perils of any kind.
Synonym:
between a rock and a hard place
bibulous
[BIB-yuh-luhs]
1. Of, pertaining to, marked by, or given to the consumption of alcoholic drink.
2. Readily absorbing fluids or moisture.
Examples:
1) Vineyards are everywhere, especially when Felix approaches Paris, the most populous city in Christendom -- and the most bibulous too, since lousy local wine had to be drunk before it turned sour in a few months. (Eugen Weber, "Renaissance Men," New York Times, April 13, 1997)
2) Ever since the joys of the fermented grape were discovered, the bibulous have been waking up feeling the worse for wear. (Sally Chatterton, "The Daily Website: www.hungover.net," Independent, September 3, 2001)
Etymology:
"Bibulous" comes from Latin "bibulus", from "bibere" - "to drink."

bicoastal
[bye-KOAST-ul]
Of or relating to or living or working on both the east and west coasts of the United States.
Example:
Richard and Laura had become a bicoastal couple, often shuttling between their primary home in New York and their vacation ranch in San Diego.
History:
"Bicoastal" is a word whose meaning shifted a few decades ago to reflect our mobile society. Our featured sense first appeared in print in 1972; prior to that, the term was occasionally used in general contexts involving both coasts (as in "a bicoastal naval defense"). These days "bicoastal" is almost always associated with people who make frequent trips between one coast and the other. An article with a Los Angeles dateline published in "The New York Times" in 1983 declared "bicoastal" to be "a popular term among an affluent, mobile set of Angelenos." But Angelenos weren't the only ones using the term - by that time, the word had already been appearing in national magazines.

biddable
[BID-uh-buhl]
1. Easily led or commanded; obedient.
2. Capable of being bid.
Examples:
1) But because they are sociable, biddable, obliging, stoic and generous, most are happy to join in. (Sue Montgomery, "The Nature of Horses," New Statesman, July 18, 1997)
2) The chaotically organised event proved nothing more than that one charismatic individual can impose his will on a lot of biddable ones. (Thomas Sutcliffe, "Last night's television," Independent, May 2002)
3) Both are calm, biddable, cooperative, sensible companions. (Bill McClure, "The right start," American Hunter, November 2003)
Etymology:
"Biddable" is from "bid", which partly comes from Middle English "bidden" ("to ask, to command"), from Old English "biddan"; and partly from Middle English "beden" ("to offer, to proclaim"), from Old English "beodan".

big house

• big
• house
• up the river
• under glass
• behind bars
• river
• glass
• bars

Prison, particularly a maximum security federal prison or jail.
Example:
After he got caught robbing a bank, Ted was sent to the big house for 20 years.
Etymology:
A 'house' is where people live, and a prison is quite large (or 'big'), home to hundreds of criminals. This phrase became popular in the early 1900's, when organized crime and large scale prisons developed in the United States.
Synonyms: up the river, under glass, behind bars

big wig

• big shot
• big wigs
• big shots
• big
• wig
• shot

An important, powerful or famous person.
Examples:
1) My brother was a big wig at Enron before he went to jail for tax evasion. 2) Of course it's a good idea, but the big wigs will never agree to do it.
Etymology: Hundreds of years ago, judges, bishops and assorted nobles wore wigs while in the royal court. (In England, some still do!) The wig was a symbol of power and prestige, and the phrase refers to this strange, old practice.
Synonym: big shot

bijou

• bijoux
• bijous
• menhir

[BEE-zhoo]
1. A small dainty usually ornamental piece of delicate workmanship; jewel.
2. Something delicate, elegant, or highly prized.
Example:
Some jewelers believe that women who buy their own bijoux are the next growth market.
History, related words:
"Bijou" (which can be pluralized as either "bijoux" or "bijous") has adorned English since the late 17th century. The word came from French, but it ultimately traces to Breton, a Celtic language (one closely related to Cornish and Welsh) spoken by inhabitants of the Brittany region of northwest France. The modern English word derives from Breton "bizou," which means "ring." That history makes "bijou" a rare gem in English because, although the Breton people occupied part of England for many years before they were pushed into France by the Anglo-Saxons in the 5th and 6th centuries, very few Breton-derived words remain in English (another Breton descendant is "menhir," a term for a prehistoric monument).

bildungsroman

• Bildung
• Roman

[BIL-doonks-roh-MAHN] ("oo" as in "good")
a novel about the moral and psychological growth of the main character
Example:
The critic described Max's first novel as "a typical bildungsroman about an angst-ridden youth struggling to find his place in the world."
History:
"Bildungsroman" is the combination of two German words: "Bildung," meaning "education," and "Roman," meaning "novel." Fittingly, a "bildungsroman" is a novel that deals with the formative years of the main character - in particular, his or her psychological development and moral education. The bildungsroman usually ends on a positive note with the hero's foolish mistakes and painful disappointments over and a life of usefulness ahead. Goethe's late 18th-century work "Wilhelm Meisters Lehrjahre" ("Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship") is often cited as the classic example of this type of novel. Though the term is primarily applied to novels, in recent years, some English speakers have begun to apply the term to films that deal with a youthful character's coming-of-age.

billet
[BIL-it]
1. Lodging for soldiers.
2. An official order directing that a soldier be provided with lodging.
3. A position of employment; a job.
4. To quarter, or place in lodgings.
5. To serve (a person) with an official order to provide lodging for soldiers.
6. To be quartered; to lodge.
Examples:
1) When he was well enough, he was retrieved back to his billet in the American zone. (Frances Stonor Saunders, "The Cultural Cold War")
2) Louisa stayed at the hospital to be near him, while the younger children were billeted at a nearby house with their Irish governess. (Douglas Botting, "Gerald Durrell")
3) We arrived jet-lagged at Tan Son Nhut airport where someone met us and hurried us off to wherever we were billeted, usually a villa on one of the wide residential boulevards that reminded everyone of a French provincial city. (Ward Just, "A Dangerous Friend")
Etymology:
"Billet" is from Medieval French "billette", from Old French "bullette", diminutive of "bulle" ("a document"), from Medieval Latin "bulla" ("a document").

billet-doux

• billets-doux
• billets
• doux
• billet

[bil-ay-DOO]
plural: billets-doux [bil-ay-DOO(Z)]
A love letter or note.
Examples:
1) Perhaps she just looked first into the bouquet, to see whether there was a billet-doux hidden among the flowers; but there was no letter. (William Makepeace Thackeray, "Vanity Fair")
2) Young lovers in Victorian England, forbidden to express their affection in public and fearful that strict parents would intercept their billets-doux, sent coded messages through the personal columns in newspapers. (Susan Adams, "I've got a secret," Forbes, September 20, 1999)
Etymology:
In French, "billet-doux" means "sweet note" or "short note": "billet" ("note") + "doux" ("sweet"), from Latin "dulcis".

billingsgate
[BIL-ingz-gayt]
Coarsely abusive, foul, or profane language.
Examples:
1) A steady stream of billingsgate could be heard coming from the basement after my father hit his thumb with his hammer.
2) Chaney would yell at him in his own particular patois -- an unapologetic stream of billingsgate far more creative than Marine drill instructors or master rappers. (George Vecsey, "Learning at Temple: Se Habla Chaneyism", New York Times, March 19, 2000)
3) Its style is an almost pure Army billingsgate that will offend many readers, although in no sense is it exaggerated: Mr. Mailer's soldiers are real persons, speaking the vernacular of human bitterness and agony. (David Dempsey, "The Dusty Answer of Modern War", New York Times, May 9, 1948)
4) The campaigns of the two Roosevelts were colorful and gave the press plenty of material but, generally speaking, deft humor seems to have replaced outright billingsgate. (George E. Reedy, "When Vilification Was in Flower", New York Times, July 15, 1984)
History, more examples:
"Billingsgate" is so called after Billingsgate, a former market in London.
From the time of the Roman occupation until the early 1980s, Billingsgate was a fish market, notorious for the crude language that resounded through its stalls. In fact, the fish merchants of Billingsgate were so famous for their swearing that their feats of vulgar language were recorded in British chronicler Raphael Holinshed's 1577 account of King Leir (which was probably Shakespeare's source for "King Lear"). In Holinshed's volume, a messenger's language is said to be "as bad a tongue ... as any oyster-wife at Billingsgate hath." By the middle of the 17th century, "billingsgate" had become a byword for foul language.

biohistory

• bio-history

1. the evolution of the interplay between human societies and their biological environments;
2. the exhumation of historical figures in order to use DNA analysis and other techniques to answer unsolved questions about their life or death.
Example:
Was Napoleon poisoned by arsenic? Did Thomas Jefferson father a child with Sally Hemings? Had Beethoven been affected by lead poisoning? All these questions are considered by biohistory.
History:
In connection with DNA, the term has been known for decades: one of the earliest examples is in the title of a 1984 book by Arno Karlen: "Napoleon's Glands and Other Ventures in Biohistory". But the word has also been used to refer to the evolution - in this sense it's recorded from the 1950s.

bird in the hand is worth two in the bush
What you already have is better than what you might or might not get in the future; a guarantee is worth more than a promise.
Example:
Take this job now because you don't know if you'll get the other one. Remember that a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.
Etymology:
This saying began as an ancient Greek proverb. Aesop used it in some of his fables. The ancient Romans repeated, and in the 1400s it was translated into English. It comes from the sport of hunting birds. Hunters thought that a bird that you had already captured ("in the hand") was better than two you hadn't yet caught ("in the bush"). Today we often hear the same advice: it is better to be content with what you already have than to reject it because you hope that something better will turn up.
Synonyms:

birds of a feather flock together

• birds
• bird
• feather
• flock
• together

People who have things in common, such as interests and ideas, usually hang out together; people who are alike often become friends.
Example:
Everyone at that table plays soccer. I guess that birds of a feather flock together.
Etymology:
This saying, which is over 2,000 years old and comes from the Bible, is based on the observation that birds of the same species flock together on the ground as well as in the air. The meaning has been broadened over the years, so that "birds" means "people" and "of a feather" means "of the same type".
birthday suit

• birthday
• suit

When you were born (on your "birthday"), you weren't wearing any clothes. When someone is said to be wearing his or her "birthday suit," it means that the person is naked. Example:
Anita's baby sister, Maria, took off all her clothes. Then she ran into their backyard and jumped into the small plastic wading pool. "Maria," Anita laughed, "you're supposed to wear your swimsuit in the pool, not your birthday suit!"
bistro

• bistrot

small European restaurant, small tavern or bar, serves wine
Example:
She was calm and sweet and later insisted on taking Phoebe out to dinner at some fancy little pseudo-Bohemian bistro. (Maitland, Sara. "Three times table". - London: Chatto & Windus Ltd, 1990) Etymology:
1922, from Fr. "bistro" (1884), originally Parisian slang for "little wineshop or restaurant," of unknown origin. Commonly said to be from Russian "beestro" - "quickly," picked up during the Allied occupation of Paris in 1815 after the defeat of Napoleon. When the Russians occupied Paris in the 1800s, whenever they visited a restaurant where the service was slow, they hammered their fists on the table and shouted, "Bistro!".
But once you start to look at its history, the story becomes less probable, mainly because the word is first recorded in French (as "bistro" in 1884 and as "bistrot" in 1892) long after those rowdy rude Cossacks supposedly came to town. "Wordhounds" are used to terms that lurk in the lexicographical shadows for decades before they become popular, but the 70-year gap is just too much to be easily accepted.
As so often, the trouble is that there's nothing obvious to put in its place and etymologists have had to cast around to find possible sources. One suggestion is "bistouille" or "bistrouille", a slangy term from northern France meaning a mixture of coffee and brandy, a cheap grade of brandy, or any drink of poor quality, possibly one that might be served in a bistro. Another guess is that it might be connected with "bistraud", a word in the Poitou dialect whose sense dictionaries and works on word history seem unable to decide on - some say it means a minor servant, but others suggest it refers to a small household, and senses such as "young cowherd" or "little shepherd" (from "biste" - "goat") are also given.
As so often, we have to suspect the popular notion, but can't find anything definite to put in its place.

bite off more than one can chew

• bite off more than you can chew
• bite off
• bite
• more
• can
• chew

to take on a task that is more than you can accomplish; to be greedy, overconfident, or too ambitious by taking on more jobs or responsibilities that one can deal with at one time.
Example:
You can't captain the team, edit the paper, and star in the play. Don't bite off more
than you can chew.
Etymology:
Versions of this saying were used in Europe in the Middle Ages and ancient China.
If you take a bite of food that's too big for your mouth you won't be able to chew it.
This idea came to mean undertaking ("biting off") a job that's too much for you to handle ("more than you can chew").

bite one's tongue

• bite your tongue
• bite the tongue
• bite
• tongue
• hold one's tongue
• hold your tongue
• hold the tongue
• hold
• tongue

take back or be ashamed of what you have said; struggle not to say something you want to say.
Example:
Don't you dare say that to me! Bite your tongue, young man!
Etymology:
It's easy to see where this saying came from. If you really put your tongue between your teeth as if you were biting it, you couldn't talk. So when people tell you to "bite your tongue", they are telling you to force yourself to be silent before you say something you shouldn't. Sometimes people say it after they've already blurted out what they shouldn't have. Then it means to take back the statement and keep quiet.
Synonym:
hold your tongue (which means you should remain silent).
bite the bullet

• bite
• bullet

To confront a painfully difficult situation; to have a major problem in one's hands; to prepare for an unpleasant experience; to brace yourself to endure with courage
something painful but necessary.
Examples:
1) After my Jimmy stole money from my company, I had to bite the bullet and fire him.
2) The principal wants to see you in her office. Get ready to bite the bullet.
Etymology:
Many word experts think that this expression came from the 19th century medical
practice of giving a wounded soldier a bullet to bite before he was operated on without
anesthetics on the battlefield. Biting on the soft lead bullet was the way of dealing with
the pain. It kept the soldier from screaming, which could distract the surgeon during the
operation.

bite the dust

• kiss the dust
• lick the dust
• kiss
• lick
• bite
• dust

to die; to fall in defeat; to fail to succeed.
Examples:
1) "Despite a valiant effort, the Blue Demons bite the dust, and our own Bobcats have won again!" cheered the announcer.
2) The spy bit the dust at the end of the book.
Etymology:
It originated from physical combat, when people fell facedown in the dust.
This cliche, which was often heard in early Western movies, is actually more than
2,000 years old and comes from a line in Homer's Iliad. It describes many dying warriors
in the Trojan War falling to the earth and "biting the dust". If people fall with their
faces in the dirt, you can think of them getting dust in their mouths. The idiom became
popular in English in the mid-1800s.
Synonyms:
kiss the dust; lick the dust
bite the hand that feeds you

• bite the hand that feeds smb.
• bite
• hand
• feed

To be ungrateful; to turn against your family or employer or other supporters; to turn against someone who helps you; to do harm to someone who does good things for you; to do something to harm a person or thing that supports you.
Examples:
1) Always try to get along with your boss, and be careful not to bite the hand that feeds you. 2) Don't bite the hand that feeds you - your parents may not be perfect, but without them you never would have gotten this far in life.
3) Even though the bricklayer knew he was biting the hand that fed him, he decided to complain to his supervisor about his salary and long working hours.
4) Eve just insulted the girl who is teaching her to ice-skate. That's biting the hand that
feeds you.
Etymology:
This saying, which has been used at least since the early 1700s, originally referred to a foolish and ungrateful dog that actually bit the hand of the owner who was feeding it. The meaning of this expression today has been extended to include people who turn against anyone who helps them. It has nothing to do with real food or actually biting anyone's hand. 'The hand that feeds you' refers to the person who takes care of you, and to 'bite' or attack that person shows that you are ungrateful.

bivouac
[BIV-wak, BIV-uh-wak]
1. An encampment for the night, usually under little or no shelter.
2. To encamp for the night, usually under little or no shelter.
Examples:
1) Rob had made his emergency bivouac just below the South Summit. (David Breashears, "Death on the mountain," The Observer, March 30, 2003)
2) They were stopped by savage winds and forced to bivouac 153 m below the day's goal. (Erik Weihenmayer, "Men of the Mountain," Time Pacific, February 4, 2002)
Etymology:
"Bivouac" comes from French "bivouac", from German "Beiwache" ("a watching or guarding"), from "bei" ("by, near") + "wachen" ("to watch").

black hat

• black
• hat

(Amer., inform.) 1. a villain, as in a cowboy movie; bad guy. Cf. white hat; (a British variant of the expression is a "bad hat" - see);
2. wear or put on a black hat, to behave villainously.
3. (Austral. slang) a new immigrant.
black sheep of the family

• black sheep
• family
• black
• sheep

the most unsuccessful, least admirable member of a family or similar group; a
disgraced person.
Example:
Geraldine's the black sheep of the family. She's always causing trouble.
Etymology:
This expression has been used at least since the early 1800s to describe a person who is a disgrace to a community or family. Shepherds did not like rare black sheep since their fleece could not be dyed any color and there weren't enough of them to sell black wool. Some people also thought that the black sheep frightened the rest of the flock and came from the devil. The saying changed over time to mean disfavored people in a family or group.
blackguard
[BLAG-uhrd]
1. A rude or unscrupulous person; a scoundrel.
2. A person who uses foul or abusive language.
3. Scurrilous; abusive; low; worthless; vicious; as, "blackguard language."
4. To revile or abuse in scurrilous language.
Examples:
1) Douglas was not a saint, though, so his behaviour and attitude were, as he wrote, 'neither better nor worse than my contemporaries - that is to say, [I became] a finished young blackguard, ripe for any kind of wickedness'. (Douglas Murray, "Bosie: A Biography of Lord Alfred Douglas")
2) The years, as time went on, imparted to him that peculiar majesty that white-haired blackguards, successful (and unpunished) criminals, seem generally to possess. (Saul David, "Prince of Pleasure")
3) Monroe wondered, but did not ask, what could have driven a young lady of such fine bearing and aristocratic attraction to leave home at a tender age and follow the fortunes of a blackguard like Reynolds. (William Safire, "Scandalmonger")
4) When we want to talk friendly with him, he will not listen to us, and from beginning to end his talk is blackguard. (Tecumseh, quoted in "Tecumseh: A Life", by John Sugden)
Etymology:
"Blackguard" is from "black" + "guard". The term originally referred to the lowest kitchen servants of a court or of a nobleman's household. They had charge of pots and pans and kitchen other utensils, and rode in wagons conveying these during journeys from one residence to another. Being dirtied by this task, they were jocularly called the "black guard."

blamestorming
A discussion (which may be at the group, community, or society level) in which members attempt to assign blame for a particular misdeed; sitting around in a group, discussing why a deadline was missed or a project failed, and who was responsible.
Example:
After four months of secret meetings and public blamestorming, the Legislature will adjourn, having done some favors for powerful special interests and approved a budget that spends hundreds of millions of dollars more than the state will take in. (Mike Doogan, "Cast of Characters Means Legislative Session Will Be a Bust," Anchorage Daily News, January 9, 2000) History: This word appeared originally in Gareth Branwyn's "Jargon Watch column" ("Wired magazine") in 1997.
"Blamestorming" = "blame" + "storm" + "-ing" as a noun suffix.

blandish

• cajole
• bland

[BLAN-dish]
1. To coax with flattery.
Synonym: cajole.
Example:
"This is the perfect car for a smart, good-looking woman such as yourself," said the salesman in an attempt to blandish Emma into taking a car for a test drive.
2. To act or speak in a flattering or coaxing manner.
History, more examples:
The word "blandish" has been a part of the English language since at least the 14th century with virtually no change in its meaning. It ultimately derives from "blandus," a Latin word meaning "mild" or "flattering." One of the earliest known uses of "blandish" can be found in the sacred writings of Richard Rolle de Hampole, an English hermit and mystic, who cautioned against "the dragon that blandishes with the head and smites with the tail." Although "blandish" might not exactly be suggestive of dullness, it was the "mild" sense of "blandus" that gave us the adjective "bland," which has a lesser-known sense meaning "smooth and soothing in manner or quality."

blandishment

• blandishments

[BLAN-dish-muhnt]
Speech or action that flatters and tends to coax, entice, or persuade; allurement (often used in the plural).
Examples:
1) But she had not risen at all to the law fellow's blandishments, his attempts to interest her in his ideas and persuade her to set forth her own. (John Bayley, "Elegy for Iris")
2) And that my English-speaking victims find my blandishments so pretty, accented as they are, and yield to my soft lustrous Italian pronunciations, is a constant source of bliss for me. (Anne Rice, "Vittorio, the Vampire")
3) Perfect, gentle reader: I will not begin this book with a tribute to your discernment, because a person of your obvious accomplishments would certainly be immune to such blandishments. (Richard Stengel, "You're Too Kind: A Brief History of Flattery")
Etymology:
"Blandishment" ultimately comes from Latin "blandiri" ("to flatter, caress, coax"), from "blandus" ("flattering, mild").

bleeding heart

• bleeding
• heart

an extremely softhearted person who feels compassion or pity towards all people,
including those who may not deserve sympathy.
Example:
Rob is such a bleeding heart. He'll donate to any charity that asks him for money!
Etymology:
This controversial term comes from America in the 20th. Some people say that
government or private charities should do more to help relieve the suffering of the sick,
the homeless, or the unemployed. These well-meaning citizens might be called "bleeding hearts" by others who feel that many people on welfare or charity should stop taking so much from others.
blessing in disguise

• blessing
• disguise

something that at first seems bad but turns out to be good; a hidden benefit.
Example:
Summer school may be a blessing in disguise. Next year you'll be ahead of your class.
Etymology:
This saying was first used in a poem 200 years ago by a writer named James Hervey, and people have been using it since. When something looks like bad luck, it may turn out to be a false appearance (a "disguise") that hides something that's really useful or fortunate (a "blessing"). Of course, you don't know that at first because the blessing is in disguise.
blind leading the blind

• the blind leading the blind
• a blind leading a blind
• blind
• leading
• lead

the uninformed attempting to inform others.
Example:
"Kurt, who spent his allowance in one day, is showing Bonnie how to budget her money. That's a case of the blind leading the blind!"
Etymology:
This saying comes from a sentence in the King James Bible (Matthew 15:14): "And
if the blind lead the blind, both shall fall into the ditch". Today we use it to describe
people who are not actually blind, but who don't know how to do something and are trying to explain it to the other people who don't know how to do it either.
blivet
1. An intractable problem.
2. A crucial piece of hardware that can't be fixed or replaced if it breaks.
3. A tool that has been hacked over by so many incompetent programmers that it has become an unmaintainable tissue of hacks.
4. An out-of-control but unkillable development effort.
5. An embarrassing bug that pops up during a customer demo.
6. A denial-of-service attack performed by hogging limited resources that have no access controls (for example, shared spool space on a multi-user system).
7. Any random object of unknown purpose.
8. An amusing trick-the-eye drawing resembling a three-pronged fork that appears to depict a three-dimensional object until one realizes that the parts fit together in an impossible way.
9. Any small, useless, unnecessary or superfluous thing.
Example:
Pressure to keep the codebase size down by using extremely dense and complicated implementation techniques can cause a cascade of implementation complexity in the system, leading to an un-debuggable mess. This used to happen frequently when fitting programs onto very small systems demanded assembler programming or tricks like self-modifying code; nowadays it is uncommon except in embedded systems, and rapidly becoming rare even there. This kind of design failure doesn't have a traditional name, but one might call it a blivet trap, after an old Army term for the results of attempting to stuff ten pounds of horse manure into a five-pound bag. ("Speaking of Complexity". - "Chapter-13.-Complexity". - "The Three Sources of Complexity": http://linux.icf.bofh.ru/books/1/ch13s01.html)
10. The name of an impossible two-pronged trident thingy.
Synonym: the Devil's pitchfork.
11. A military term for rubberised bladders that were used by various air forces for holding fuel at temporary locations, usually small airstrips (once drained, the bags would go flat and be easily stored until required for use elsewhere); a fuel bladder used for refuelling away from base.
12. A person, self-important and full of himself, for whom the description "ten pounds of horse manure in a five-pound bag" is only too apt.
Etymology:
Allegedly from a World War II military term meaning "ten pounds of manure in a five-pound bag". It looks like a mixture of "blip" and "widget", though it might instead be from "blip" plus "rivet". It's often described as ten pounds of horse manure in a five-pound bag (though the quantities vary between tellers) and the excuse to retell that "explanation" to a naive onlooker is frequently the reason for using the word.
It is sometimes said that the name derives from "believe it".
blog

• blogosphere
• blogrolling
• blogger
• web log
• weblog
• web
• log
• web logger
• weblogger
• logger

1. A Web-based diary of pithy commentary from users, generally focused on a specific subject area; a shared on-line journal where people can post diary entries about their personal experiences and hobbies. Contrast with chat and mailing list.
2. to create, to fulfill a weblog
Example, relative words: 1) When they write the account of the 2004 campaign, it will include at least one word that has never appeared in any presidential history: blog. Whether or not it elects the next president, the blog may be the first innovation from the Internet to make a real difference in election politics. 2) The constellation of opinion called the blogosphere consists, like the stars themselves, partly of gases. This is what makes blogs addictive - that is, both pleasurable and destructive: They're so easy to consume, and so endlessly available. Their second-by-second proliferation means that far more is written than needs to be said about any one thing. To change metaphors for a moment (and to deepen the shame), I gorge myself on these hundreds of pieces of commentary like so much candy into a bloated - yet nervous, sugar-jangled - stupor. Those hours of out-of-body drift leave me with few, if any, tangible thoughts. Blog prose is written in headline form to imitate informal speech, with short emphatic sentences and frequent use of boldface and italics. The entries, sometimes updated hourly, are little spasms of assertion, usually too brief for an argument ever to stand a chance of developing layers of meaning or ramifying into qualification and complication. There's a constant sense that someone (almost always the blogger) is winning and someone else is losing. Everything that happens in the blogosphere - every point, rebuttal, gloat, jeer, or fisk (dismemberment of a piece of text with close analytical reading) - is a knockout punch.
Etymology, history:
Short for "Web Log" ("weblog"), this term refers to a list of journal entries posted on a Web page. Anybody who knows how to create and publish a Web page can publish their own blog. Some Web hosts have made it even easier by creating an interface where users can simply type a text entry and hit "publish" to publish their blog. It is common for someone who maintains a , a personal journal that's shared on the Internet, to refer to the blog as a brain dump (see).
Synonyms:
Web log / weblog, blogger, blogrolling, blogosphere

bloke
(coll.)
1. man, fellow, guy
Example:
He's a good bloke!
2. general term for a man of unknown name
Example:
Look at that bloke over there!
3. a man who is (usually) old and/or eccentric Synonym: geezer
4. affectionate term used to refer to a male animal
5. (Austral.) person in charge; boss; also "big bloke"
6. (obsolete) stupid person
7. (obsolete) prostitute's pimp; formerly also spelt "bloak"
8. Bloke: Commune of the Republic of Slovenia.
Etymology:
In British slang a term is known from the middle of the 19th century, as well as in the USA. It turns up slightly earlier in Australia, where it referred to the boss or the man in charge. It's still common in the UK, where it has much of the sense of the American "guy". However, at one time, Americans also used it in the sense of a stupid person. For a long time, the experts were unsure where it came from. Some, especially in the United States, suggested it derived from the Celtic word "ploc" ("a large, bull-headed person"). Others have suggested that the "stupid person" sense may be from the Dutch "blok" ("a fool"), which is where we get "blockhead" from. This "stupid person" derivation is probably correct, but we're now fairly sure that the word in the sense of a man derives either from Romany, the language of the Rom or gypsies, or more probably from Shelta, an ancient secret language used by Irish and Welsh tinkers and Gypsies. It may ultimately derive from Hindi "loke" ("a man"). A slightly earlier word of the same sense, "gloak", may come from the same source (in the slang of the early 19th century, a "buzz-gloak" was a pickpocket, where to "buzz" was to pick a pocket).

blood is thicker than water

• blood
• thick
• thicker
• water

one can expect more kindness from a family member than from a stranger; a person
will do more for a relative than for anyone else.
Example:
Mrs. Penn chose her grandson instead of me to work in her store. I guess blood is thicker than water.
Etymology:
This saying, that means that family ties count more than friendship, comes from
Germany in the 12th century. Perhaps it comes from the idea that water can evaporate
without leaving a trace, but blood leaves a stain is more permanent. This suggests that
relatives ("blood") are more important ("thicker") than people who are not related
("water").

blook

• Blooker
• "greasy spoon" cafe
• greasy spoon cafe
• "greasy spoon"
• cafe
• greasy spoon
• greasy
• spoon

A book based on material from a weblog.
Example: There aren't any blook stores yet. Nor is there a New York Review of Blooks. But the blook - a book by a blogger - is a growing presence in the publishing biz. (U.S. News & World Report, 4th March 2006)
History, related words: Many recent neologisms have emerged from the comparison between the real and online world. The transition from printed to electronic page has been one such area, turning diaries into blogs (weblogs) and magazines into webzines. And now, in what seems a bizarre twist, we've come full circle, as blogs, commentaries originating firmly in the virtual world, are becoming blooks, texts made of real bits of paper that you can hold in your hand. Latest estimates say that there are more than 60 million blogs worldwide, and though many simply consist of the daily observations of ordinary people, a growing number of bloggers are seeing themselves as budding authors, using the medium to write blog books, or blooks, which they can pay to have printed. Among the most popular blooks to emerge so far is "Egg Bacon Chips & Beans" <http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/ 0007213786/russelldavies-20/203-5832922-4397568> - "50 Great Cafes And The Stuff That Makes Them Great", by Russell Davies (HarperCollins, October 2005). Based on Davies's blog eggbaconchipsandbeans <http://russelldavies.typepad.com/eggbaconchipsandbeans>, this guide to the UK's best 50 "greasy spoon" cafés (small cafes that serve greasy food, i.e. short-order fried foods) has become a cult book, and is among those blooks competing for the recently unveiled Blooker Prize <http://www.lulublookerprize.com>, an award for bloggers turned bookwriters whose name bears a tongue-in-cheek resemblance to the prestigious Booker Prize <http://www.themanbookerprize.com>. The prize's founder, American multimillionaire Bob Young, argues that whereas the Booker is often perceived as highbrow and removed from the ordinary reader, the Blooker taps into a growth area in popular culture. Many bloggers with a passion for a particular subject and an accessible writing style have won a regular and appreciative audience, creating the potential for blooks to become increasingly popular in the future. "Blook" is a blend of the words blog and book, a combination first coined in 2002 by American journalist Jeff Jarvis. He invented the term when popular Hollywood blogger Tony Pierce held a competition to name his first printed book based on blog material. The term "blook" is also sometimes used to describe a book which is serialised on a weblog, with chapters published one by one as separate blog posts.


blot one's copybook

• blot the copybook
• blot
• copybook

1. To spoil one's good reputation, etc, especially by some foolish or unfortunate mistake.
Examples:
1) He blotted his copybook when he was brought to the police station on the charge of being drunk and disorderly.
2) Though it has blotted its copybook a little of late, the weather so far this year has been quite extraordinarily docile.
2. To make a mistake that will be both noted and remembered; to commit some gaffe that spoils one's record.
Etymology, more examples:
It's mainly a British or Commonwealth phrase, though rather old-fashioned. A look at recent examples shows that it has survived almost exclusively in sports journalism. A typical example appeared in the Racing Post on 19 July 2004: "Westender, last year's Champion Hurdle runner-up, blotted his copybook in dramatic style when refusing at the first fence of the beginners' chase and catapulting jockey Timmy Murphy to the ground in the process." Another recent British example, from the Daily Telegraph, shows how it was once more widely used: "At the end of the war, Deedes notes, Muggeridge of MI6 'blotted his copybook by befriending PG Wodehouse and his wife'" (Wodehouse had been accused of treachery because he broadcast on German radio during the War.)
The expression might have come from old school-rooms. The books contained examples of handwriting for pupils to copy in the spaces provided into their copybooks. Sometimes children used to practise handwriting and calligraphy by laboriously copying down words and sentences written up upon the blackboard. To drip or smear ink on your copybook, to make a splodge of ink rather than to use blotting-paper was a sign of inferior penmanship or clumsiness that was greatly looked down on. Given that we're talking about the days of inkwells here, a less than careful child might well "blot his (or her) copybook" - an error which would then be a matter of permanent record. An example appeared in 1871 in "Little Men" by Louisa May Alcott: "Franz heard him say his lessons there, so no one could hear his blunders or see how he blotted his copybook."
Our schools now don't have copybooks, or bottles of ink to blot them with, but it wasn't until the era of the copybook was almost over that the phrase took on a figurative meaning. The first case is dated 1933, from "A Prince of the Captivity" by John Buchan: "Mr Stannix told me that he would have been safe for the vacant under- secretary-ship last spring if he hadn't blotted his copy-book."


bloviate

• blowhard
• bloviation
• bloviator

[BLOH-vee-ayt]
To speak or write at length in a pompous or boastful manner.
Examples:
1) Anyone who has ever spent an idle morning watching the Washington talk shows has probably wondered: how did these people become entitled to earn six-figure salaries bloviating about the week's headlines? (Robert Worth, "Quick! The Index!", New York Times, June 3, 2001)
2) After five years as president and thirty years as a political figure, this colossal oaf is still unable to discipline his urge to... bloviate. (R. Emmett Tyrrell, Jr., "American Spectator", December 19, 1997)
3) We follow him minute by minute through a day in his office - bloviating amiably with colleagues on the telephone, letting his secretary rewrite his clumsy letters and worrying about the possible hatred of his subordinates. (John Brooks, "Fiction of the Managerial Class," New York Times, April 8, 1984)
Etymology, related words:
"Bloviate" is from "blow" + a mock-Latinate suffix "-viate". Compare "blowhard" - "a boaster or braggart". "Bloviation" is the noun form; a bloviator is one who bloviates.
"Bloviate" is closely associated with U.S. President Warren G. Harding, but to him the word wasn't insulting; it simply meant "to spend time idly." Harding used the word often in that "hanging around" sense, but during his tenure as the 29th U.S. President (1921-23), he became associated with the "verbose" sense of "bloviate," perhaps because his speeches tended to the long-winded side. (H.L. Mencken said of him, "He writes the worst English that I have ever encountered. It reminds me of a string of wet sponges; it reminds me of tattered washing on the line; it reminds me of stale bean soup, of college yells, of dogs barking idiotically through endless nights. It is so bad that a sort of grandeur creeps into it. It drags itself out of the dark abysm of pish, and crawls insanely up the topmost pinnacle of posh. It is rumble and bumble. It is flap and doodle. It is balder and dash." ) Although he is sometimes credited with having coined the word, it's more likely that Harding picked it up from local slang while hanging around with his boyhood buddies in Ohio in the late 1800s.


blow chunks

• blow chunk
• blow
• chunks
• chunk

1. To vomit; to be sick.
Example: I feel really sick - I could blow chunks right here!
Synonyms: puke, spew.
2. Something that is not good, or a major disappointment.
Example: That movie blew chunks! I can't believe I paid $9 to see it.



blow hot and cold

• blow
• hot
• cold

The wind comes from all directions, bringing warm breezes on some days and bad weather on others. So people use this saying to mean that a person or a thing is temperemental, or has frequent changes of mood. Example:
Felicia and her mother were driving in their old station wagon. "Jinny sure is moody lately," Felicia said. "One minute she's sweet and funny, and the next minute she's yelling at someone or sulking!" "I know, her mother said, "that sister of yours blows hot and cold - just like this old car! Sometimes it drives like a dream, and sometimes you can't even get it started!"

blow off steam

• blow off
• steam
• blow
• vent

To release stress or anger.
Examples:
1) Rob screams and yells a lot. He should find some other way to blow off steam. 2) Playing sports after school helps students blow off steam.
Etymology:
The idea is that anger and stress can build up inside a person and needs to be released, like an engine releasing pressurized steam. Synonym: vent


blow one's own horn

• blow your own horn
• brag about oneself
• brag about
• brag
• blow
• horn

to praise yourself; to call attention to your own merits (intelligence, skills, success, or abilities).
Synonym:
to brag about oneself.
Example:
When you fill out an application for a job, blow your own horn.
Etymology:
In ancient Roman times, a blare of trumpets announced the arrival of a great hero. So the blowing of horns meant someone important was coming. Today, people who blow (or toot) their own horns are boasting about their superior qualities. Sometimes you have to do that a little (when you apply for a job, for instance), but if you do it too much, you could be called a braggart.

blowdown
an instance of trees being blown down by the wind; a tree blown down
Example:
For Arbor Day, the students helped clear out the blowdown from the severe winter storm, then they planted saplings to replace the trees that had been lost.
Etymology:
"Blowdown" is an apt term to refer to what happens when fierce winds meet mighty trees - and the trees lose the battle. The word originated with outdoorsmen about 100 years ago, and since then it has been used to describe the act of blowing down the trees, or the wind that does the blowing, or the trees that get knocked over from the force of the wind. It is also occasionally used for the process of blowing off gas or steam, or for the apparatus used for such a process.
Synonym: windfall


blue blood

• blue
• blood
• upper crust
• upper
• crust

of high or noble birth; an aristocrat; from the upper class of society.
Example:
Steve is marrying a very rich girl from high society, a real blue blood.
Etymology:
Though this expression has been used in English since the early 1800s, it actually comes from an older Spanish saying. Old, aristocratic Spanish families used to boast that their skin was fairly light because they had not intermarried with the darker-skinned Moors. The Spaniards' veins showed through their skins as visibly blue in color. If their skin was darker because they had intermarried, the blood would not appear so blue. "Blue blood" is a translation of the Spanish words "sangre azul". Today anyone can be called a blue blood if he or she is of noble birth, a member of high society, and so on.
Synonym: upper crust.

blue grass music

• bluegrass music
• blue grass
• music
• bluegrass
• blue
• grass

a kind of quick "country" music; a form of music developed in the mountains of Kentucky and Tennessee, having a
strong beat, and the banjo and guitar are prominant instruments.

bluejacking

• bluejack
• bluejacker
• blue-jacking
• blue-jack
• blue-jacker

Etymology & Meaning:
"Blue" (from the name of the Bluetooth technology) + "jack" ("to rob, mug or steal"; 1873, "jack up", originally "abandon, give up," later (1885) "hoist with a jack"; then "increase prices, etc." (1904, Amer.Eng.), all from the noun) + "-ing".
The Bluetooth radio communication system used in many current mobile phones; this is designed to allow you, for example, to use a wireless, hands-free headset while the phone is safely in your pocket. But any Bluetooth device is capable of talking to any other device over a range of a few metres. A phone with Bluetooth enabled will tell you about any devices nearby that you can communicate with. Mischievous people have started to exploit this by sending cheeky messages to some stranger they see in a public place, usually personalised ones such as "I like your tie". It is called
"bluejacking".
Example:
"But why would somebody bluejack a stranger's phone? The motive behind the craze is to freak out other Bluetooth users that you might encounter in public - for example, a bluejacker will check out other Bluetooth users on the tube and drop them a message that only someone in the same place will appreciate, for example, their choice of newspaper or colour of their top or just a message to let them know that they've been bluejacked." ("Znet UK", 6 Nov 2003)

blurb

• bromide
• bromidiom
• oofle
• voip
• floogijab
• tintiddle

A short description of a product written for promotional purposes.
Example:
The aim, says the blurb, is to develop other publishing and ancestor-tracing businesses. ("Independent, electronic edition of 19891010". London: Newspaper Publishing plc, 1989, Business material)
Etymology, history, a few other neologisms:
We associate the word "blurb" most closely with books, which is only fair, since it was invented for a meeting of the American Booksellers Association in 1907. The American illustrator and humorist Gelett Burgess had written "How to be a Bromide" in 1906, introducing "bromidioms", hackneyed phrases (such as "I don't know much about art, but I know what I like") uttered by boring and predictable people whom he named "bromides", after the then familiar sedative, potassium bromide. These days, the bromides are more frequently the commonplace statements rather than the people making them, but Burgess is credited with inventing the word. For the meeting in 1907, his book was presented to members of the Association attending their annual dinner. As was usual, a special bookplate was designed, which featured a young woman, whom Burgess named Belinda Blurb, shouting the praises of his work in effusive language (see <http://quinion.com?BB>). The booksellers and publishers clearly found the word an excellent one for the puffing encomiums on the dustjackets of books and by about 1914 it had become the standard term for them. Gelett Burgess invented more new words than anybody else at that period, which he incorporated into several books. An "oofle" is a person whose name you can't remember; a "voip" is a type of food that lacks all gastronomic delight; a "floogijab" sounds like a compliment but has a sting in the tail; a "tintiddle" is an esprit de l'escalier, a witty comment you think of too late. None of these gained any circulation whatsoever, but "bromide" and "blurb" have ensured his linguistic immortality.

body lift

• body
• lift
• body contouring
• contouring
• torsoplasty
• total body lift
• total
• central body lift
• central
• belt lipectomy
• circumferential lipectomy
• belt
• circumferential
• lipectomy
• excision
• bariatric
• bariatric surgery
• lower body lift
• lower
• upper body lift
• upper
• total body lift
• total
• mastopexy
• brachioplasty

A procedure in plastic surgery involving the tightening of loose skin in the hip, buttock, upper thigh and stomach area.
Examples: 1) An increase in the number of patients undergoing bariatric [weight-loss] surgery has encouraged plastic surgeons to seek improved methods of treating the cosmetic problems associated with massive weight loss, such as deformities of the buttocks region. & Dr. Sozer will be discussing his use of an autologous buttock implant, using the patient's own tissue, in conjunction with a lower body lift. (US Newswire, 29th April 2005) 2) If you have around seven and a half thousand US dollars to spend and are contemplating splashing out on a luxury holiday or home improvement, you might be interested to know that in 2005 the same amount of money would buy a completely new' you, since this figure represented the average cost of a body lift. History, related words: Over 75,000 cosmetic surgery operations are performed in Britain every year, but these no longer consist merely of facelifts or nose jobs'. Many procedures involve a substantial re-shaping of the entire torso, fashionably described as body contouring. It is in this domain that the term body lift has emerged, an informal description of the surgical procedure technically referred to as torsoplasty, and also known as total body lift, central body lift or belt/circumferential lipectomy. A body lift operation normally lasts between 4 and 7 hours and is performed under general anaesthetic. It typically involves a combination of surgical cutting (excision') and suction in order to remove the excess body tissue. Body lifts are often performed in an attempt to deal with the surplus unelasticated folds of skin resulting from extreme weight loss, either through dieting or bariatric (weight-loss) surgery. There are various kinds of body lift depending on which area of the body needs most attention: a lower body lift generally concentrates on the thighs, buttocks and lower abdomen, whereas an upper body lift deals with the back, breasts and upper abdomen. Cosmetic surgery is big business on both sides of the Atlantic, and body lift operations have been available in the USA for several years. In the UK, the concept of a body lift was brought into the public eye in late 2003, when ITV featured a programme about Valerie Rogers, a healthy, active swimming coach who became morbidly obese after a car accident which triggered a growth hormone imbalance and rendered her immobile. After two years of dieting she lost 22 stone or 308 pounds (just under 140 kg), but was left with an unbearable amount of excess skin, later removed in a pioneering total body lift operation. Other procedures in the same domain include breast lift, technically referred to as mastopexy (from Greek "mastos" - "breast"), and arm lift, designed to remove loose skin from the upper arms and technically referred to as brachioplasty (from Latin "brachium" - "arm").

body sushi

• body
• sushi
• nyotai mori
• Naked Lunch

Eating Japanese food (sushi: rice with raw fish wrapped in seaweed) off the body of a naked woman.
Example:
The naked plate piled high: this is body sushi.
History:
This began in California last Summer and has since been reported in Israel and China. The technique is said to be an ancient Japanese method of serving food, known as "nyotai mori", which is still sometimes available today, though not usually listed on menus. Body sushi was imported to Hollywood by the celebrity chef Gary Arabia, who also seems to have supplied the English name. It brings a whole new meaning to the phrase "Naked Lunch". Body sushi, Arabia says, must be considered in context: "This is a celebration of beauty and food and environment."



boggle

• boggles

1. To prevent; hesitate (when confronted with a problem, or when in doubt or fear); to be shocked, be awed; to shock; to startle with amazement or fear; to overcome with amazement.
Example:
This boggles the mind! Synonym: flabbergast, bowl over
Etymology, more meanings:
1598, "to start with fright" (as a startled horse does), from M.E. "bugge" = "specter" (among other things, supposed to scare horses at night). The meaning "to raise scruples, hesitate" is from 1638.
2. (South Yorkshire dialect) boggles - A nasal discharge.

boilerplate

• boiler plate
• boiler
• plate

[BOY-ler-playt]
1. Syndicated material supplied especially to weekly newspapers in matrix or plate form.
2. Standardized, formulaic, or hackneyed language.
Example:
Much to my disappointment, the mayor-elect's speech consisted primarily of boilerplate and offered no information about his plans for his term in office.
History:
In the days before computers, local newspapers around the U.S. relied heavily on feature stories, editorials, and other printed material supplied by large publishing syndicates. The syndicates delivered that copy on metal plates with the type already in place so the local papers wouldn't have to set it. Printers apparently dubbed these syndicated plates "boiler plates" because of their resemblance to the plating used in making steam boilers. Soon "boilerplate" came to refer to the printed material on the plates as well as to the plates themselves. Because boilerplate stories contained mostly filler and very little hard news, the word acquired negative connotations and gained another sense widely used today: hackneyed or unoriginal writing.


bolt from the blue

• out of the clear sky
• out of the blue sky
• out of
• clear
• sky
• bolt
• the blue
• blue

something sudden, unexpected, and shocking.
Example:
Mr. Barnes's pop quiz hit us like a bolt from the blue.
Etymology:
This expression has been used since at least the early 1800s. Picture a calm, clear, blue sky. You'd probably be surprised, even startled, if a bolt of lightning suddenly cracked down. In the same way, any big surprise is like lightning shooting out of a clear, blue sky. You just don't expect it to happen. (Note: this expression usually refers to very bad news).
Synonym: out of the clear / blue sky.


bombinate

• buzz
• hum
• drone
• bound
• bombilate
• bombastic

[BOM-buh-nayt]
Meaning & Synonyms:
To buzz; to hum; to drone.
Examples:
1) He is often drunk. His head hurts. Snatches of conversation, remembered precepts, prefigured cries of terror bombinate about his skull. (Elspeth Barker, "Nobs and the rabble, all in the same boat", Independent, September 22, 1996)
2) Sometimes the computer bombinates way into the night, stops for a bit of rest, then resumes its hum at the early hours of the morning. (Cheryl Glenn and Robert J. Connors, 'New St. Martins Guide to Teaching Writing')
3) Mr. Carter bombinated on, seemingly oblivious to the frequency of yawning and watch-checking in the audience.
Etymology, related words:
"Bombinate" sounds like it should be the province of bombastic blowhards who bound up and bombard you with droning blather at parties - and it is. The word derives from the Greek "bombos," a term that probably originated as an imitation of a deep, hollow sound (the kind we would likely refer to as "booming" nowadays). Latin speakers rendered the original Greek form as "bombus" ( "a boom"). Then Late Latin produced "bombinatus", past participle of "bombinare", alteration of Latin "bombilare". The root gave forth a veritable din of raucous English offspring, including not only "bombinate," but also "bomb," "bombard," "bombilate" (which means the same thing as "bombinate"), and "bound" ("to leap"). However, the Latin "bombus" is not a direct ancestor of "bombastic" ("ornate, florid; inflated, exaggerated"), which traces to "bombyx," a Greek name for the silkworm.


bon ton

• bon
• ton

[bahn-TAHN] 1. Fashionable or elegant manner or style. 2. The proper or fashionable thing to do. 3. Fashionable society; a fashionable social set.
Examples:
1) Here, braving the bon ton of New York in the early 1900s, he seemed uncomfortable throughout, as if he had been invited to an Edith Wharton party for which he was not suitably dressed. (Stanley Kauffmann, "Women in Danger", New Republic, January 15, 2001)
2) Though he was a college junior, his father, Bruno, was an owner of . . . a restaurant in Manhattan popular with the bon ton, so he knows what he was talking about. (Anthony Haden-Guest, "The Last Party")
3) The bon ton here is to be grave and learned. (Horace Walpole)
Etymology:
"Bon ton" is from the French "bon" (from Latin "bonus", "good") + "ton" (from Latin "tonus", "tone").


bon vivant

• bon
• vivant

[bon-vee-VONT]
A person with refined and sociable tastes, especially one who enjoys fine food and drink.
Examples:
1) For the unregenerate "peasant" (the term that he often used about his mother, whom he despised) had gone there with the successful glass distributor, shrewd investor, versatile talker, and ... bon vivant whose motto was "The best is good enough for me." (Ted Solotaroff, "Truth Comes in Blows")
2) Girard is a bon vivant and intellectual while his son is a pragmatic city financier. (Akin Ojumu, "There's little and Lars," The Observer, May 25, 2003)
Etymology:
"Bon vivant" comes from French "bon" = "good" (from Latin "bonus") + "vivant", present participle of "vivre" = "to live," from Latin "vivere".


bonce

• bounce
• bouncer

1. Game played with large marbles; a form of jacks or fivestones, especially in Yorkshire: it was played with four or five earthenware cubes and a large earthenware marble, almost the size of a golf ball, and the idea was to bounce the marble, pick up as many of the cubes as you could, and then catch the marble before it hit the ground.
Example:
Now you can play bonce online!
2. (informal; England) Head.
Example:
You cannot expect to be taken seriously with a bovine's milking tackle perched on your bonce. ("New Musical Express". - London: Holborn Publishing Group, 1992)
Etymology:
The original "bonce" was a large marble that featured in several children's games of the nineteenth century. The "English Dialect Dictionary" suggests it's a version of "bounce", since such a marble was also called a "bouncer" and was "the large earthenware marble used for bouncing or playing with checks or cubes". But to judge from a comment in Henry Mayhew's "London Labour and the London Poor" of 1851, such marbles were also made of other materials: "We did as we liked with mother, she was so precious easy, and I never learned anything but playing buttons and making leaden 'bonces,' that's all." The shift to a slang term for the head seems to have happened around the 1880s.


bonehead
An unintelligent person; someone who does stupid things.
Examples:
1) Jason put his hand right in the fire. What a bonehead! 2) That bonehead doesn't know his right from his left.
Etymology:
The outside part of your head (skull) is made of bone, which protects your brain. If your whole head were made of bone, and you didn't have a brain, you wouldn't be very intelligent. A "bonehead" is someone with all bone, no brain.


bonhomie

• holiday
• bonhomie

[bah-nuh-MEE]
Good-natured easy friendliness; good nature; pleasant and easy manner.
Examples:
1) We look forward every year to champagne and eggs benedict, served up with plenty of bonhomie, at our friend's annual New Year's Day brunch.
2) That bonhomie which won the hearts of all who knew him. (Washington Irving, "Oliver Goldsmith")
3) And what of the salesman's fabled bonhomie, the Willy Lomanesque emphasis on the importance of being liked? ("How to Manage Salespeople", Fortune, March 14, 1988)
4) I would carefully study the exploits of positiverole models like Peter Gabriel, Jimmy Carter, and Alec Baldwin, andattempt to emulate their radiant bonhomie. (Joe Queenan, "My Goodness: A Cynic's Short-Lived Search for Sainthood")
History:
English speakers adapted "bonhomie" from the French "bonhomme," which means "good-natured man" and which is itself a composite of two other French words: "bon", meaning "good," and "homme," meaning "man." That French compound traces to two Latin terms, "bonus" (meaning "good") and "homo" (meaning either "man" or "human being"). English speakers have warmly embraced the French term and its meaning, but we have also anglicized the pronunciation in a way that may make native French speakers cringe. At this festive time of year, "bonhomie" is also sometimes used to mean "an atmosphere of good cheer," so you might say a merry family party has a "holiday bonhomie."


bonzer
(Australian slang) Excellent, first-rate, great.
Example:
Scott has a bonzer time, cruising the streets of Erinsborough.
History, related words, more examples:
This is an archetypal Australianism, typical of the lively and expressive slang of that country. It now feels dated, though it had a good run from early last century (it was first recorded in a Sydney newspaper in April 1904) up to the 1940s, when it began to fall from favour. "Bonzer" was a general term of approval, so that if the weather was fine, for example, you might say "Bonzer sunny day!" This early example is in a verse from "Songs of a Sentimental Bloke" by C J Dennis, published in 1915:
This ev'nin' I was sittin' wiv Doreen,
Peaceful an' 'appy wiv the day's work done,
Watchin', be'ind the orchard's bonzer green,
The flamin' wonder of the settin' sun.
Where "bonzer" comes from is open to debate (one story, known to be untrue, says it comes from two Chinese words meaning "good gold", a similar tale to one told about "dinkum") but early examples suggest it may be from French "bon" - "good", influenced by "bonanza". The latter is Spanish, meaning fair weather or prosperity; as it was first used in American English in the 1840s for a successful gold mine, this is intriguingly parallel to the Chinese interpretation. If the French/Spanish/American origin is correct, "bonzer" flowed from a linguistic melting-pot, appropriately for the country.


boob

• boobs

1. (Slang) A fool, dunce, dummy, silly person.
Etymology:
1909, Amer.Eng. slang, perhaps from "booby".
Synonyms: dumbbell, dummy, dope, booby, pinhead.
2. (British Slang) An error, blunder, mistake.
3. (Vulgar Slang; South Yorkshire dialect) A female breast.
Synonyms: breast, bosom, knocker, tit, titty.
4. To commit a faux pas or a fault or make a serious mistake.
Example:
I blundered during the job interview. Synonyms: sin, blunder, goof.


boone
1. A town in Iowa;
2. A town in Colorado;
3. A town in North Carolina;
4. Daniel Boone (1734-1820), a legendary American pioneer, one of the first settlers of the American West;
5. Nico Boone, a soccer player; 6. someone who stabs you in the back; someone who betrays you.
Example: Don't trust him: he's a boone.
7. see: pull a Daniel Boone.

boozehound
Someone who drinks a lot of whiskey; a drunk.
Example:
Tom is quite a boozehound - he has half a bottle of Johnnie Walker Red for lunch!
Etymology:
A 'hound' is a hunting dog, and 'booze' is liquor. So a 'boozehound' is someone who pursues liquor like a dog hunting prey. Synonyms: lush


borborygmus
intestinal rumbling caused by moving gas.
Example:
Jim, having skipped breakfast, was beset by borborygmus long before noon, and was mighty grateful for the pile of holiday treats next to the coffee machine.
Etymology:
Actually, "borborygmus" has been part of English for at least 240 years; its earliest known use dates from 1762. We picked it up from New Latin, but it traces to the Greek verb "borboryzein," which means "to rumble."
Unless you're a gastroenterologist, chances are you never knew there was a name for those loud gurglings your stomach sometimes makes. And looking at the word itself, you might think it's just some crazy coinage invented recently by someone who thought the word matched the rumbling sound.

borboryzein
rumble


bork
1. To attack shamelessly, with no regard for the truth, and with total disregard for doing the right thing.
Example:
Judicial nominee after judicial nominee gets borked by the Democrats.
History:
Word came into existence after the Democrat-controlled United States Senate voted not to confirm Robert Bork's nomination (by President George Herbert Walker Bush) for the Supreme Court. The man held what until then had would have been considered the necessary credentials, so why wasn't his nomination confirmed? It was certainly not because he lacked the ability, the intellect, or the qualifications. What he lacked was likeability and a liberal bent; he definitely didn't meet the Democrats' ideological criteria: he was most avowedly a conservative judge. Democrats during the 1980s had come to the conclusion that they would never succeed in getting laws passed that would advance their liberal agenda. Their solution (Thought up by Harvard Law Professor Lawrence Tribe and cohorts?): use whatever means necessary to stack the United States judicial system with liberal, activist judges, judges willing to make new law through their interpretations of the laws on the books. In order for their plan to succeed, it was necessary to hold up judicial appointments as long as possible in the hopes that a Democrat would soon be returned to the Presidency - while concurrently claiming that they were trying to keep a Republican President from stacking the court with radical conservatives so far out of the mainstream as to be a threat to the nation's very existence. The ploy remains in use today as many of President George W. Bush's judicial nominations languish without even a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing. God forbid that the nominees actually get to the Senate floor for a vote - most would probably be confirmed. If you're a liberal Democrat, you may choose to believe that today's Democrats are just doing to President Bush what yesterday's Republicans did to President Clinton. The facts and the corresponding judicial appointment statistics belie any sound basis for such a claim. A possible result: We have virtually no criminals in the United States today - just misunderstood, downtrodden members of society - people who committed their crimes because society made them do it.
2. To use a toilet plunger.
Example:
My little sister flushed her teddy bear down the toilet and I had to spend an hour borking to unclog it.
Etymology:
Originating from the sound made when one uses a toilet plunger.

borked

• bork
• borken
• bjorken
• b0rked

Also: b0rked, borken, bjorken
Broken, defunct, not working, screwed, dysfunctional, buggered, shafted, nackered, duff, busted.
Examples:
1) You see, my Windows machine is totally borked. It bluescreens immediately on boot.
2) I don't hear a dial tone. I think the phone's borken.
3) Software Quality Assurance guy to Clumsy Programmer: Your new code isn't just failing in a few places - this time it is totally borken.
Etymology, more examples:
Common deliberate typo for "broken".
In computer programming, this adjective describes code that is so buggy that even the error messages are failing. From an apocryphal story about a misspelled user alert window which read, "User should not get here, this code is borken".


born with a silver spoon in one's mouth

• be born with a silver spoon in one's mouth
• born
• silver spoon
• bear
• silver
• spoon
• be born
• mouth

born to wealth, comfort, and privilege.
Example:
Fran always wants the finest, most expensive things. Was she born with a silver spoon in
her mouth?
Etymology:
A spoon made out of pure silver is expensive. Sometimes a silver spoon is given as a gift to a newborn baby. If a rich baby has many expensive things from the start of life, like a silver spoon (almost as if he or she were born with the spoon in his or her mouth), we can use this well-known idiom to describe that person. The phrase was used by Cervantes, the Spanish writer, in the early 1600s in the novel "Don Quixote".

borrow trouble

• borrow
• trouble
• don't borrow trouble
• holler before one is hurt
• holler
• cross a bridge before one comes to it
• cross a bridge before smb. comes to it
• cross that bridge when you come to it
• cross the bridge when you come to it
• cross
• bridge
• come
• before
• don't cross a bridge before you come to it
• cry before one is hurt
• cry before smb. is hurt
• cry
• hurt

To worry for nothing about trouble that may not come; to make trouble for oneself needlessly.
Examples:
1) Don't borrow trouble by worrying about next year. It's too far away.
2) You are borrowing trouble if you try to tell John what to do.
Synonyms:
cross a bridge before smb. comes to it, cry before smb. is hurt, holler before one is hurt.


boss shot

• bosh-shot
• boss-eyed
• boss
• bosh
• shot
• eyed
• eye

1. awry; boss-eyed 2;
2. a boo-boo, a flub
Etymology:
It is a nineteenth-century introduction. The origin seems to come from a dialect word meaning "bungle".
Synonym: bosh-shot

boss-eyed

• boss shot
• bosh-shot
• boss
• bosh
• shot
• eyed
• eye

(UK slang)
1. having eyes that look in towards the nose;
2. boss shot; awry.
Etymology:
It is a nineteenth-century introduction. The origin seems to come from a dialect word meaning "bungle".

bossiness

• authoritarianism

One's ambition to grasp all power to himself.
Example: William Hague, the new leader of the Conservative Party, charge the Labour government with bossiness.
Synonym: authoritarianism.
Etymology: See bossy 1 (boss).

bossy

• boss
• cow

1. a person who's domineering or fond of giving people orders.
In most varieties of English, the compounds bossy and bossiness have a sense of a person who is officious or dictatorial, though with a nursery feel that is reminiscent of Violet Elizabeth Bott, a whingeing, snivelling sneak;
2. a political leader with a corrupt following;
3. (slang) excellent, first-rate, superlative.
Etymology:
The sense has become common among English-speaking young people recently. It started in the US at least as far back as the sixties; some writers argue that it is a nineteenth-century formation, too.
General Etymology:
That's an adjective from "boss", a word
which derives from the Dutch "baas", meaning "master". It was taken
to the New World by the Dutch about 1650.
This is a long way from the original meaning of boss, which came into the language in North America from the Dutch baas, "master", which was taken there by Dutch settlers in the 1650s (and which also turns up in South African English, derived from Afrikaans). It gained acceptance in the US as a useful alternative to master, which would have been the standard English term of the period but which settlers escaping the Old World understandably disliked because of its connotations of subservience. For many years it was a slangy usage, I'd guess more common in speech than in writing. In the 1830s James Fenimore Cooper condemned it as a barbaric vulgarity; this denunciation had no effect and it settled in as a permanent part of the language. It came back across the Atlantic to Britain sometime about the middle of last century to join the much older and unconnected sense of boss, "protuberance", which we borrowed from the French about six centuries earlier.
NB: "Boss" and its derivatives can be mildly jocular in British English, a quality which is apparently absent in, say, Australian or US English. If a worker says "Yes, boss!" to their manager in a British context, they're being facetious, since nobody would really call their boss "boss" to his face (though it's an extremely common term otherwise).
4. A cow.
The bovine sense is neither linked to a person who's domineering or fond of giving people orders nor does it come from a modification of the proper name Bessy or Betsy, as some have suggested. The true story is somewhat elusive and there are two possible explanations.
One theory has it that the noun is from West Country dialect. The word "boss" is known from the eighteenth century, sometimes as "buss" or "buss-calf" or "bussa", a name that was given to a young, unweaned calf. It's suggested that this word was taken to North America by some of the pioneering immigrants. The other theory suggests that "bossy" might have come from the Latin "bos" for an ox or cow (it's the source of the word "bovine" that I used earlier). It's just possible that the West Country dialect word might also have come from the Latin term, though it seems an obscure and literary word to have been taken up in dialect. If that theory is right, no matter which of the two theories you pick, you end up in Latin.
As usual, nobody's prepared to put any money on one or the other.
"Bossy" is too poorly recorded in its early years for it to be clear what was going on in people's minds at the time.


bossy boots

• bossy boot
• bossy
• boots
• boot

(child's word) someone who is very bossy


botec
(SMS) back of the envelope calculation


botnet
A type of bot running on an IRC network that has been created with a trojan.
Examples:
1) Hackers can take control of your computer, rather than simply damaging it. A hacker who infects your computer with a virus through instant messaging, IRC or e-mail can send commands making it a robot or "zombie" on the hacker's botnet.
2) This modus operandi is fuelling a growing crime wave against e-commerce in which these networks of bots, dubbed botnets, are increasingly being offered for hire by hacking groups. ("New Scientist", 6 Nov. 2004)
3) A more sinister use of botnets is sabotage, police say. A fear is growing that a botnet could be used to take down a major data network or prominent Web sites. ("Birmingham Post", 13 Jul. 2004)
History:
"Bot" + "net", where "bot" is an abbreviation for "robot".
One of the methods of those using the Internet for illegal purposes is to grab control of your computer and use it to distribute spam and viruses anonymously. A computer taken over in this way is known to hackers as a "zombie". When an infected computer is on the Internet the bot can then start up an IRC client and connect to an IRC server. The Trojan will also have been coded to make the bot join a certain chat room once it has connected. Multiple bots can then join in one channels and the person who has made them can now spam IRC chat rooms, launch huge numbers of Denial of Service attacks against the IRC servers causing them to go down.
A more sinister recent development has been the entry of organised crime groups, who harness networks of these zombies, called "botnets". The aim in this case is not usually to send spam but to bring down a Web site through what's called a distributed denial-of-service attack. The network of zombies is told to send a very large number of request signals to the site all at once, so denying access to legitimate users and possibly causing the Web server to collapse under the load. There have been reports that this typ