Fun Animal Idioms 🐘🐥

Here are a few animal idioms that can make our day-to-day conversations much more fun:

1. Cold turkey 🦃

People often use the idiom 'quitting cold turkey' when they decide to abruptly stop doing something that is considered bad for them, such as smoking.

MEANING: To quit something (like an addiction) abruptly and without fanfare

USAGE: To cure his addiction to video games, he decided to go cold turkey and gave his entire collection away.

2. Hold your horses 🐴

The phrase is historically related to horse riding or travelling by horse, or driving a horse-drawn vehicle.

MEANING: It’s a way of telling someone to stop or slow down

USAGE: Hold your horses, kids! The show will be starting in five minutes.

3. Get someone’s goat 🐐

This expression comes from a tradition in horse racing. Thought to have a calming effect on high-strung thoroughbreds, a goat was placed in the horse’s stall on the night before the race.

MEANING: To upset, irritate or anger someone

USAGE: “The way she corrects everything really gets my goat! Thank you very much, Miss Know-it-all!”

4. Earworm 👂🏻

The term earworm derives from a literal translation of the German word Ohrwurm, which has been used to describe such ‘cognitively infectious’ pieces of music.

MEANING: A catchy song or tune that you can’t seem to get out of your head

USAGE: “Ariana’s new song has been stuck in my head for a week. I’d do absolutely anything to get rid of this earworm!”

5. The elephant in the room 🐘

It is based on the idea/thought that something as conspicuous as an elephant can appear to be overlooked in codified social interactions.

MEANING: A huge and obvious problem that everyone avoids talking about

USAGE: Avoiding the topic is like draping a tablecloth over the elephant in the room.

6. Have (or get) your ducks in a row 🦆

Real ducklings, of course, walk in a line behind their parent, and the expression ducks in a row certainly brings that image to mind.

MEANING: Get everything organised, straightened up and accounted for before embarking on an activity or project

USAGE: I’ll get my ducks in a row before going on vacation. I don’t want my officemates thinking I’m lousy at my job.

7. Eager beaver 🐻

The phrase is relatively new, it was first used in the early 1900s to describe the very eager recruits who were willing to do anything to impress their commanding officers during the war.

Beavers are large rodents that are well known for their skill of building dams that are very large compared to their size.

MEANING: An overly enthusiastic person; someone who is overzealous and excited about doing a job.

USAGE: Martha is such an eager beaver, always volunteering on new projects.

8. Running around like a headless chicken 🐥

This idiom originates from as early as the 14th century in England when chickens were popularly killed by chopping off their heads with an axe. Some of the chickens ran around in a panic, crashing into objects after their heads had been chopped off, just before they dropped dead.

MEANING: To run around doing a lot of things in a disorganised, ineffective manner.

USAGE: He ran around like a headless chicken after he missed his flight to the US.

9. The tail wagging the dog 🐕

This expression comes from a popular phrase that says: “a dog is smarter than its tail, but if the tail were smarter, then the tail would wag the dog”.

MEANING: A situation wherein a smaller or less important group appears to control a larger or more important person or organisation

USAGE: John was just hired yesterday, and today he’s bossing everyone around. It’s a case of the tail wagging the dog.

10. Monkey business 🐒

This idiom is based on the playfulness of monkeys.

MEANING: Shenanigans; activities that could be considered mischievous, questionable or even illegal; antics that are generally disapproved of

USAGE: Those three boys are cooped up inside the room. I wonder what monkey business they’re planning this time.

---

I hope you enjoyed reading this post. Do like, share and subscribe to never miss another update.

Love

Goohika ✨