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Expressions you love

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    #152
    Nervous Wreck
    Closed Accounts Posts: 16,115 ✭✭✭✭Nervous Wreck


    I really like "... like there's no tomorrow."

    Such a lovely phrase.


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    #153
    7 Seconds...
    Registered Users Posts: 8,471 ✭✭✭7 Seconds...


    Paddy Cow wrote: »
    Like a lawnmower :pac:
    or Like a chainsaw :)


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    #154
    jprboy
    Registered Users Posts: 1,351 ✭✭✭jprboy


    A Tyrant Named Miltiades! wrote: »
    I'll be there!

    There should be a Boards Naynagh-Show Beers

    I'll try to spot the mod !
    sligojoek wrote: »
    I wasn't at that show since I was about 15. Is anyone going to that music festival the week after. I was half thinking of going down

    This? Just noticed that it's STRICTLY OVER 18

    http://www.nenagh.ie/events/details/lilys-happy-days-festival

    Back on topic:

    I'm going for the messages - really annoyed the American bro in law !


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    #155
    Toots
    Administrators, Business & Finance Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 16,905 Admin ✭✭✭✭✭Toots


    osarusan wrote: »
    Shitehawk


    A sad loss to the Irish vernacular.

    That's one I use daily :pac:

    My favourite is "If I'd a garden full of mickies I wouldn't let her look over the wall"


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    #156
    cbyrd
    Registered Users Posts: 3,214 ✭✭✭cbyrd


    It's far from your ar5e you won't sit on it, my nana's reply to complaints of injury when we were kids.

    That'll put a halt to your gallop.
    (again my nana .. To everything from injury to pregnancy)

    There's always an ar5e or an elbow on you.
    (said to someone who complains a lot.. again my nana .. )

    Neither a borrower nor lender be...

    Fool me once, shame on you
    Fool me twice, shame on me.

    I've loads more, when I remember them


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    #157
    bottlebrush
    Registered Users Posts: 8,192 ✭✭✭bottlebrush


    Paddy Cow wrote: »
    Like a lawnmower :pac:

    Up the middle and down the sides


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    #158
    glynf
    Registered Users Posts: 3,387 ✭✭✭glynf


    I doubt it, said Croker.


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    #159
    Westernyelp
    Registered Users Posts: 2,371 ✭✭✭Westernyelp


    I gave her a shot under the tail


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    #160
    Westernyelp
    Registered Users Posts: 2,371 ✭✭✭Westernyelp


    He was as drunk as forty cats


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    #161
    [Deleted User]
    Posts: 0 ✭ [Deleted User]


    "You and whose army?" My favourite retort in secondary school when somebody would threaten to "hammer ten shades of shîte out of you". And it was always the midget fúckers - one with gelled spiky hair like Howard Jones and fast legs springs to mind! - who'd come out with the best retorts because they were so small they knew you couldn't really beat them into next week in good conscience


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    #162
    jca
    Closed Accounts Posts: 8,585 ✭✭✭jca


    One of my grandfather's ( a witty Dub) If brains were gunpowder he wouldn't have enough to blow his hat off.


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    #163
    Mr.Wemmick
    Registered Users Posts: 1,049 ✭✭✭Mr.Wemmick


    That fella's so nosy, he'd look into yer mouth to see what yer eating.

    Am spitting feathers.. (for a cup of tea or a drink)

    Are you coming or going?

    Let that tea draw.. - my mother never stopped shouting that at us when we were growing up :D


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    #164
    [Deleted User]
    Posts: 13,712 ✭✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    riffmongous wrote: »
    Related to this one, e'er, no idea how to spell it, pronounced air anyway
    "Have you air a dog?"
    Anyone else no it and what it actually means?
    E'er (air): Ne'er (nare) = Any : None

    - Have you e'er a dog youssir? [Do you have any dog, my gentleman friend?]
    - ne'er a dog youssir, declare unto God [Upon my oath, good sir, I have no dog]


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    #165
    jprboy
    Registered Users Posts: 1,351 ✭✭✭jprboy


    sligojoek wrote: »
    Ger, do you remember a saying around Nebnagh years ago?

    Heard, (pronounced Hurd) I will.

    You might be thinking of something like the following which is an actual conversation I remember from Nenagh CBS in the early 80s:

    Seamus: Johnny, I hear you like The Clash.
    Johnny: Heard I didn't !! (i.e. I do like said band very much)


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    #166
    sligojoek
    Registered Users Posts: 25,420 ✭✭✭✭sligojoek


    "Jaysus, the smoke would blind you." = Has anybody got a fag?


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    #167
    Autochange
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 1,648 ✭✭✭Autochange


    When you catch someone trying to fool or get one over on you : I didnt come down on the bus from Cavan


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    #168
    sligojoek
    Registered Users Posts: 25,420 ✭✭✭✭sligojoek


    jprboy wrote: »
    You might be thinking of something like the following which is an actual conversation I remember from Nenagh CBS in the early 80s:

    Seamus: Johnny, I hear you like The Clash.
    Johnny: Heard I didn't !! (i.e. I do like said band very much)
    yeah, It worked both ways.

    Do you want a pint?
    Heard I don't. (Of course I want a f*ckin pint)

    CBS 80s I got out of there with my life in '81.


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    #169
    bubbles o hara
    Closed Accounts Posts: 430 ✭✭bubbles o hara


    When I'm feeling sorry for myself, I still think of a quote my mother would use. " I cried because I had no shoes, until I saw a man who had no feet"


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    #170
    sligojoek
    Registered Users Posts: 25,420 ✭✭✭✭sligojoek


    A Tyrant Named Miltiades! wrote: »
    E'er (air): Ne'er (nare) = Any : None

    - Have you e'er a dog youssir? [Do you have any dog, my gentleman friend?]
    - ne'er a dog youssir, declare unto God [Upon my oath, good sir, I have no dog]
    Joe Duffy: A ne'er do well robbed me walleh.

    One evening I was going into Nenagh for a few pints. I'd fallen off a motorbike the day before and was still wearing the torn jeans with the oilstains.

    My father took a look at me and said, "Have you ne'er a better britches than that to put on you".

    Another one of his was, "Turn down that scutterin' wireless. I can't hear me ears." That phrase was coined the night 2FM came on air for the first time.


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    #171
    [Deleted User]
    Posts: 0 ✭ [Deleted User]


    Some of my many favourite expressions from the Irish:

    There's no geeks nor meeks out of him (said by my mother-in-law a couple of hours ago about the sleeping little leanbh in the pram), sometimes just shortened to 'There's no geeks out of him' (straight from the Irish, 'Níl gíog ná míog as')

    They were walking out with each other for many's the day (Bhídís ag siúl amach le chéile le fada an lá). Older people in Connacht would still describe a couple doing a line with each other/going steady/courting in English as 'walking out with each other'.

    Love the "in it" structure. Is it yourself that's in it/There were two of them in it, etc. Again, straight from the Irish Tusa atá ann/Bhí beirt acu ann, etc.


    The entire "on you/her/him" etc structure to convey:

    1. visual features - e.g. He has a fine head of hair on him, 'Bhí cúl breá gruaige air', etc, but of course when describing somebody's hair we describe them as a 'Fear Rua' (literally Red man in English), Buachaill bán (literally 'white boy' in English), fear liath (literally grey man in English), etc because there is obviously no need to mention hair as it's understood that you cannot be a red man, grey man, etc and that bán in this context means 'fair-haired' as it would be pointless to describe somebody's skin as white when everybody has the same skin colour. (A black-skinned person in Irish is 'duine gorm', blue person - because 'Fear Dubh' was obviously booked long ago by the devil! - while a white-skinned person in Irish is 'duine geal', not 'duine bán' which would, as you now know, mean a fair-haired person!)

    2. emotion. Lovely ways to describe somebody as being sad 'Bhí brón uirthi' (She was sad; literally 'There was sadness on her') or 'Bhí sí faoi bhrón' (She felt sad; literally 'She was under sadness'), Bhíodh áthas air (He used to be happy, literally 'There used to be happiness on him') Tháinig gruaim air (He became sad/gloomy; literally sadness/gloominess came on him) again conveys the weight of the emotion and the way emotions come on you.

    So many more...


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    #172
    sligojoek
    Registered Users Posts: 25,420 ✭✭✭✭sligojoek


    Did you hear John Ryan is "Great with" Mary Kelly?


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    #173
    snowflaker
    Closed Accounts Posts: 3,922 ✭✭✭snowflaker


    Who lit the fuse on her tampon?


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    #174
    Mountainsandh
    Registered Users Posts: 6,700 ✭✭✭Mountainsandh


    "who pissed in your cornflakes ?" Mr M has a wealth of great Irish expressions. I hear that one occasionally when my morning grumpiness is severe. I secretly like it but I can't let on, 'cos I'm grumpy.

    He's not the sharpest knife in the drawer.
    or The lights are on, but there's nobody home.

    Here in co Waterford I hear a lot of people using "with" for duration, as in : "he's been here with a week". Or something like that. I like it, I think I've been told it's local anyway, and it's so wrong yet I hear many people, even youngsters using it.


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    #175
    Mena Mitty
    Registered Users Posts: 5,944 ✭✭✭Mena Mitty


    sligojoek wrote: »
    Did you hear John Ryan is "Great with" Mary Kelly?

    I heard they were 'stepping out' and doing a 'great line' they also say if she's looking for a 'trip up to the alter' she'll be waiting 'til the cows come home' as he's 'tipping' four times widow Teasie the tasty temptress, who as luck would have it entertains her gentlemen callers in the privacy of her parlour, so Mary Kelly will never find out. Rumour has it Mary Kelly is 'barking up the wrong tree' looking for husband material in John Ryan as the whole parish knows he been 'firing blanks' for years.


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    #176
    pickarooney
    Moderators, Arts Moderators Posts: 35,125 Mod ✭✭✭✭pickarooney


    Mountainsandh wrote: »
    "who pissed in your cornflakes ?" Mr M has a wealth of great Irish expressions. I hear that one occasionally when my morning grumpiness is severe. I secretly like it but I can't let on, 'cos I'm grumpy.

    He's not the sharpest knife in the drawer.
    or The lights are on, but there's nobody home.

    Here in co Waterford I hear a lot of people using "with" for duration, as in : "he's been here with a week". Or something like that. I like it, I think I've been told it's local anyway, and it's so wrong yet I hear many people, even youngsters using it.

    That's directly from Irish where 'le bliana' is literally 'with years' and means 'for years'. I've only ever heard it from Munster people.


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    #177
    Are Am Eye
    Registered Users Posts: 2,166 ✭✭✭Are Am Eye


    8a643cb3aadf15ebd59ee90bc48b929142e010af


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    #178
    Padkir
    Registered Users Posts: 1,289 ✭✭✭Padkir


    "Well the curse of f**k down on ya". When someone/something does something against you or you're really pissed off at them.


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    #179
    [Deleted User]
    Posts: 13,712 ✭✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    [Deleted User] wrote: »
    Some of my many favourite expressions from the Irish:

    There's no geeks nor meeks out of him (said by my mother-in-law a couple of hours ago about the sleeping little leanbh in the pram), sometimes just shortened to 'There's no geeks out of him' (straight from the Irish, 'Níl gíog ná míog as')
    'Miog' is one I haven't heard in years!

    My siblings and I were often told, growing up, that we weren't to let a miog/mig out of us, which seems to be a similar literal translation from the Irish, ná lig míog asaibh.


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    #180
    kyeev
    Registered Users Posts: 210 ✭✭kyeev


    If a neighbour was described as "looking very shook", said neighbour would be dead within the week.

    A few other ones:
    It was like herding cats.
    As sure as I'm standing here.
    God blast ya.
    Oh Diabhal (Irish for devil).
    Look at the cut of him.


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    #181
    Estrellita
    Registered Users Posts: 638 ✭✭✭Estrellita


    I actually use quite a lot of these sayings. Two more...


    "Gone like a fart in the wind"

    "Betwixt and between it all"


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