BS: Muddled Metaphors

Subject: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: jimlad
Date: 22 Jan 03 - 10:25 AM

Here are some examples of Analogies and Metaphors taken from High School Essays.


She had a deep,throaty,genuine laugh,that sounded just like a Dog makes just before it throws up.

Her vocabulary was as bad as,like,whatever.

He was as tall as a 6ft 3inch tree.

The little boat drifted gently across the pond exactly the way a Bowling Ball would'nt.

She grew on him like she was a colony of E.coli and he was room temperature Scotish beef

Her hair glistened in the rain like a moustache after a sneeze.

He spoke with the wisdom that can only come from experience,like the guy who went blind because he looked at a Solar Eclipse without one of those boxes with a pin-hole in it and now goes around the country
speaking at High Schools about the dangers of looking at a Solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pin-hole in it

He fell for her like he was a mob informant and she was the East river.

The hailstones leaped from the pavement,just like maggots do when you fry them in hot grease.

The plan was simple,like my brother-in-law Phil.But unlike Phil.This plan just might work.

He was as lame as a duck. Not the metaphorical lame duck either,but a real duck that was actually lame.Maybe from stepping on a land mine or something.

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: JennyO
Date: 22 Jan 03 - 10:31 AM

"They hung in the air, exactly the same way that bricks don't"

(from The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy)

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: jimmyt
Date: 22 Jan 03 - 10:42 AM

jimlad, I will have to say that these certainly gave me a chuckle....well, kind of like a wood chuck would, but not the metaphorical one, more like my brother-in-law Phil would ...as a wood chuck...never mind!

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: Steve Parkes
Date: 22 Jan 03 - 11:16 AM

I like mixed metaphors better: "I smell a rat -- I'll nip it in the bud". Somebody suggested the cure for mixing metaphors is to get the perpetrator to draw the result.

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: Cluin
Date: 22 Jan 03 - 12:52 PM

Nobody but nobody is as good at mixing and muddling metaphors as our Canadian PM, Jean Chretien. On a diplomatic visit to the White House a few years ago, he was asked by a journalist about the Quebec separatist issue and how he planned to deal with it in the near future.

His answer: "I am not about to open dat Pandora's Box of Worms at dis time."

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: TIA
Date: 22 Jan 03 - 01:05 PM

favorites I've actually heard recently...

"half of one, six dozen of the other"
"oops, I'm being Mrs. Misanthrope"
"piece of pie" (presumably synonymous with easy as cake)
"ChiChi I Fridays" (did the two restaurant chains merge?)

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: Susanl
Date: 22 Jan 03 - 10:08 PM

I knew a woman who mixed things up all the time and never knew she was doing it. There were so many but I only remember one. "If you can't take a joke, get out of the kitchen."

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: momnopp
Date: 22 Jan 03 - 10:22 PM

You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make 'im dance!

An old family favorite.


Also, "fish or get off the pot."

Peas,

JudyO

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: Homeless
Date: 22 Jan 03 - 10:57 PM

My favorite, which I use frequently, was taken from Bloom County years ago, "You can lead a yak to water but you can't teach an old dog to make a silk purse out of a pig in a poke."

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: khandu
Date: 22 Jan 03 - 11:05 PM

Here's a couple that I heard some time back.

"Her eyes were as blue as B.B. King would be if someone stole Lucille"

"She's as plain as Martha White's Self-Rising Flour" ????

k

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: Amos
Date: 22 Jan 03 - 11:37 PM

These are actually painful!!

As painful as a poke in the eye with a sharp stick -- a real stick, not a metaphorical one, like my cousin Phil, except that e is not sharp....

A

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: Kaleea
Date: 23 Jan 03 - 01:43 AM

My High School English teacher had a favorite saying which was illustrated beautifully in my Senior English class by the following story.
    In my High School Senior English class, some mmmty years back, I shall never forget the dramatic reading of his science essay by one of our first-string football players. We were reminiscing about this great moment in the annals of creative writing at a reunion a few years back when the former English Teacher pulled the original our of his pocket & asked our special football player to read it. He lumbered up to the podium, much as he did all those years back, and began to read, "Mah ess-ayee iz 'bout, uh, you know, SEXyullee tranzMUtated disEEzuz. Therz baysicullee 3 kindz: one, Syphilliusus; two: Gonuhherruh; an three: Vayee Dayee. . . .(hey, we took state in Oklahoma 3 years in a row with this guy!! I remember, as I was in the band.)
          Oh yes, the teacher's muddled metaphor: "You may lead a football player into English class, but you can't teach him English." (sincere apologies to our smarter brother jocks)

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: JennyO
Date: 23 Jan 03 - 04:36 AM

Steve Parkes, I remember it as:

I smell a rat,
I see it floating in the air,
I shall nip it in the bud.

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: winterchild
Date: 23 Jan 03 - 05:02 AM

LOL!

so, in a similar vein, does anyone know the name of that infamous "first lines" contest -the "it was a dark and stormy night" thing?

WinterC

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: C-flat
Date: 23 Jan 03 - 05:15 AM

I don't know if this is the contest you're refering to, WinterC, but there's some pretty awful/funny openers here!
C-flat

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: winterchild
Date: 23 Jan 03 - 05:25 AM

THAT'S IT!!!

Thanks, C_Flat.

Guys, you have to check this out!

WinterC

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: mooman
Date: 23 Jan 03 - 07:42 AM

This is from a UK biology exam and is almost 'Spaw-like in its imagery:

Question: Why are poplar trees often planted in rows?

Answer: A sixty foot poplar can break wind over a distance of 100 yards.

Thanks for these Jimlad...I was needing laugh today sitting here trying to write proposed amendments to European law...!

moo

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: GUEST
Date: 23 Jan 03 - 10:24 AM

Does the Pope shit in the Woods?

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: GUEST,Raedwulf
Date: 23 Jan 03 - 10:26 AM

""piece of pie" (presumably synonymous with easy as cake)"

I suspect that one's actually a Bowdlerized version of "piece of ...", well, summat that starts with the same two letters, anyway...

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: Hamish
Date: 23 Jan 03 - 10:56 AM

Barking up the wrong frying-pan without a paddle.

Fly in the woodpile.

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: Beccy
Date: 23 Jan 03 - 11:16 AM

My Gramp, a retired pastor, is famous for one gaff he made during a sermon:
"You can lead a horse to drink, but you can't make him water."

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: pict
Date: 23 Jan 03 - 11:33 AM

Dorothy Parker was taking part in a show in which the participants were to come up with a witty sentence that had to include a word chosen by the host.She was given the word horticulture and she came up with"You can lead a horticulture but you can't make her think"

I once read an opening line in a paperback"The snow was falling dandruff like" I didn't get any further than that.

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: jimlad
Date: 23 Jan 03 - 01:57 PM

Yhe yoing fighter had a hungry look,the kind you get from not eating for a while.

The ballerina rose gracefully en pointe,and extended one slender leg behind her,like a dog at a fire hydrant.

Long separated by cruel fate, the star crossed lovers raced across the grassy meadow towards each other like two freight trains,one having left Cleveland at 6:36pm.travellihg at 55mph,the other from Topeka at 4:19pm. at a speed of 35mph.

He was deeply in love. When she spoke,he thought he heard bells,as if she was a garbage truck backing up.

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: Amos
Date: 23 Jan 03 - 02:48 PM

A GARBAGE truck?? So THAT's what it feels like!! I have been SO wrong all these years!! ROTFLMAO!


A

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 23 Jan 03 - 04:09 PM

You buttered your bread--now, lie in it.

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: GUEST,Guest (Deda)
Date: 23 Jan 03 - 04:43 PM

Wilderness is "where the hand of man has never set foot before."

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: momnopp
Date: 23 Jan 03 - 10:58 PM

Hamish--

"Barking up the wrong frying-pan without a paddle."

ROTFLuntil my stomach hurts!!!!!!!!!!!!

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: GUEST,Tom Dowling
Date: 24 Jan 03 - 12:16 AM

"We'll burn that bridge when we get to it."

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: Mudlark
Date: 24 Jan 03 - 01:12 AM

About this thread....I'm definitely of two minds...

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: Ebbie
Date: 24 Jan 03 - 01:19 AM

As my boss said at a company meeting: I was hoping one of you would take that ball and roll with it.

She also said about one of the divisions that had fared poorly that year: This year they've had their share of bumps and grinds.

And she was/is a very bright woman too!

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: Terry K
Date: 24 Jan 03 - 04:10 AM

there was one recently about a guy who went on hunger strike and his family, when asked what they thought, decided he had "bitten off more than he can chew".

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: DMcG
Date: 24 Jan 03 - 06:20 AM

This is not a metaphor, but I really muddled up a cliche yesterday. I said something was a case of "you show me mine and I'll show you yours".

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: jimlad
Date: 24 Jan 03 - 04:06 PM

It hurt the way your tongue hurts after you accidentally staple it to the wall.

She walked into his office like a centipede with 98 legs missing.

Even in his latter years,Granddad had a mind like a steel trap,only one that had been left out so long it had rusted shut.

John and Mary had never met. They were like two humming birds who had also never met.

From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie,surreal quality,like when you are on vacation in another city and Jeopardy comes on at 7:00PM instead of 7:30.

Her face was a perfect oval, like a circle that had two sides gently compressed by a Thigh Master'

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: David Ingerson
Date: 24 Jan 03 - 05:23 PM

god! you folks are great! I needed a good break from work. Someone (was it Warren Sapp?) said just the other day about getting into the SuperBowl, "We're at the peak of the door now and all we have to do is open it." something like that.

But that's not nearly as good as stapling your tongue to the wall (by accident)!

David

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: TheBigPinkLad
Date: 24 Jan 03 - 05:29 PM

Not quite metaphorical, but a genuine extract from a school essay: "The metal on the outside of the plane is less than 3 mm of an inch thick."

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: GUEST,Taunus
Date: 24 Jan 03 - 07:16 PM

"Denny walks into the room. Denny's the kind of guy who looks like a closed
book until you open it"

"...Esterhaus is a big man, someone who could change the tires from a truck without first removing the bolts"

opening lines: "All they took were the aborted fetuses"

(read in film scripts)

Taunus

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: Genie
Date: 26 Jan 03 - 02:29 AM

There's a country song that I like except for a mixed metaphor that stands out (to me) like a sore thumb. I think the song is titled "I Wouldn't Change You If I Could." The last line of the last verse is
"If I were a potter and you a piece of clay,
The only thing I'd change would be your name."

Whenever I hear that, I can't help picturing some guy marrying a hunk of clay!

Genie

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: winterchild
Date: 27 Jan 03 - 01:22 AM

Refresh

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: TIA
Date: 27 Jan 03 - 08:40 AM

We are like two ships that go bump in the night

Subject: RE: BS: Muddled Metaphors
From: Steve Parkes
Date: 27 Jan 03 - 09:01 AM

Plenty of those in the English Channel just now!