Malaphors
(midwest.social)
eightys3v3n to 
Funny
I LOVE these. Funnier the longer I think about them. Almost serious or useful then just completely out of left field.
Oh, we have those in German too:
1st Idiom: Life is no pony farm
2nd Idiom: Life is no sugar-licking.
Both meaning life isn't easy.
Combines into: Life is no pony-licking
One hand washes the other.
One crow doesn't pick the others eye.
The former meaning: "Quid pro Quo" and the latter: "One scoundrel doesn't tell on the other."
Combines into: One crow washes the other.
Like an elephant in the china shop. (The proverbial bull in the china shop)
Who's sitting in a glasshouse shouldn't throw stones. (If you are yourself vulnerable to / guilty of the allegation, don't throw the proverbial first stone)
Combines into: Who's sitting in a china shop shouldn't throw elephants.
Who digs a pit for another will fall in themself. (Meaning is obvious)
Who's sitting in a glasshouse shouldn't throw stones. (As above)
Combine into: Who's sitting in a glasshouse will fall in themself.
Had a pig. (That was lucky)
Sponge over it. (Erase it / it's okay / forget it)
Combine into: Pig over it.
Note: in German sponge (Schwamm) and pig (Schwein) begin with the same syllables.
Not seeing the forest for the trees. (as in English)
Standing like the ox in front of a mountain. (being baffled or at a loss)
Combine into: Standing like the ox in front of a tree.
Or: Not seeing the ox for the mountains.
Hitting two flies with one swatter. (As in two birds, one stone)
Morphs into: Hitting two swatters with one fly.
Better the sparrow in your hand than the pigeon on the roof. (Be content with what you have in your hand instead of going for the bigger thing that's harder to get.)
Morphs into: Better the mute (woman) in bed than the deaf (woman) on the roof.
Note: "Die Taube" is feminine and can mean both "the pidgeon" and "the deaf". (dove, deaf, you can see the connection in English still)
Better the sparrow in your hand than the pidgeon on the roof. (As above)
Shooting cannons at sparrows. (Overreacting)
Combine into: Shooting pidgeons at sparrows.
Bojack Hosreman had a couple of good ones. My favorite was: “Fool me once, shame on you, but teach a man to fool me, and I’ll be fooled for the rest of my life!”
Nobody's human.
I like to make the animal abuse idioms animal-friendly:
- There's more than one way to pet a cat.
- Let's not feed a dead horse.
- This way we can get two birds stoned at once.
One I've actually heard is, you couldn't swing a dead horse in here.
This opens up a whole new bag of cats.
I'm here to kick ass and take names, and I'm all out of ass!
*clicks pen*
Names, please...
Light a man a fire and you warm him for a night. Set a man on fire and you warm him for the rest of his life!
I got in trouble at a corpo job for saying "We'll jump off that bridge when we get there."
A bird in the hand, and you’ll never work a day in your life.
"It's a dog-eat-dog world out there, and I'm wearing Milk-Bone underwear."
"People who live in glass houses can count their chickens in the rain."
"We'll cross that water when it's under the bridge."
“We’ll cross that water when it’s under the bridge.”
That is by far the laziest take on any variation on that saying I've heard so far. 10/10, fuckin' love it. Just a straight up "we'll do nothing until the problem comes to us".
Adding this one to the noggin file.
I actually thought I made up the "I'll burn that bridge when I get to it." Kind of sad to see others knew of it.
Another one I think I made up is...
"Bob's your cousin."
I don't get the cousin part. "Bob's your uncle" sure, but what's the other half?
And Robert's your father's brother.
Why does this screenshot look like a highschool teacher photocopied it from a book?
Well I certainly didn't make it better. The place I found it on Instagram is a fucking video of a picture so I had to screenshot the paused video of a picture 😑
Something about that explanation has me rolling ahaha
Glad someone else is already commenting on it I was ready to just say "Do I look like I know what a jpeg is?" and leave.
Hank Trill anyone?
All the good ones are like that
You opened this can of worms, now lie in it
I resent, and resemble, this
You can beat a dead horse but you can't make it drink.
You can lead a racehorse to water but you shouldn't piss in its mouth
That's a very apt lesson
Speaking of bridges, I like "cry me a river, build me a bridge, and get over it!"
"This is a tough nut to swallow"
"It's not the end of the day"
For the first one, my ex used to say that to me all the time.
You need to eat more pineapple
I think watermelon is the meta now
One I accidentally said a while back and now use for anything that's both unhinged and comes out of nowhere: Out of left pocket
Oh yeah! How could I forget:
"Get two birds stoned at once"
My favorite is 'not the sharpest hammer in the kitchen.
Works double because then they're a meat mallet
I'm fond of "not the brightest cookie in the knife drawer"
Untill the cow freezes over is funny till you realize this is an issue in some places.
Does the pope shit in the woods?
Only if the Bear is Catholic
And if no one hears it happening, is he Catholic?
My all time favorite. Sometimes I go with "is a bear Catholic?"
I use this far too often
I said this at the root of the thread, but since we are talking about variations of this malaphor, I use:
Does a bear shit in the pope's hat?
"I don't know, CJ! I keep telling you I'm not Catholic!"
What’s the pope part supposed to say?
I've heard it as "Is the pope catholic?"
Does the pope wear a funny hat? Does a bear shit in the woods?
is the pope a bear?
When in the woods alone, would you rather run into a pope or a bear?
Women would choose a bear, normally. I thought we went through this a year or so ago.
And a bear in a funny hat?! How could you not want a hug?!
From the Buffy-verse.
Harmony, the dumbest vampire.
"You're preaching to the horse's mouth."
Does a bear shit in the pope's hat?
Does pope shit in the woods?
Is a bear catholic?
Is the pope a bear?
Da' Bears!
Please tell me that wasn't the potty tentacle...
What can I do under Martian Law?
edit: so everyone knows, this is Sealab 2021, a great show and unfortunately the actor who played Murphy passed away.
It's like a koala crapped a rainbow in your brain! That's my yelp review of Sealab 2021. Creator went on to do Frisky Dingo, and most prominently, Archer.
Adam Reed. Don't know what Matt Thompson has been doing. 70/30.
Technoblade said the second in a dream smp stream. And also mentioned it was a malaphor. Not saying he is related with this or anything if it could be misinterpreted like that. It just mafe me remember that. The surprising part for me is that the other people in the call didn't know what an idiom was or something lol.
Or something like that don't trust this to be exactly how that happened.
"Yesterday we were at the brink of abyss, today we took a step forward"
Omg I shot diet pepsi out of my nose
I laughed. Thank you! "You've opened this can of worms, now lie in it" is my fav.
That's a whole different kettle of wax
My favorite is, "Why don't you make like a tree and go fuck yourself?"
I'm gonna OD on nostalgia from this
This one's really good since some trees can self-pollinate.
Is that why some family trees are so linear?
get two birds stoned
My favorite one that everyone hates is "Even a blind elephant can remember to nut twice a day"
Blind squirrel finds a nut
Broken clock is right twice a day
Elephants never forget
You're shutting the bag after the cat's bolted
Bob’s your oyster
Kill two cats with one bag
Bring out your dead!
When life gives you melons, you might be dyslexic.
That's some Groucho Marx style shit.
Time flies like an arrow; fruit flies like a banana.
An old friend always said "time flies like fruit flies like a banana."
I've always preferred this version because of the flow, and because it makes you think a little more before it clicks.
You just made me dylexic I read melons, then when i read dyslexic i go back to read again and i read lemons but wait, wasn't it melons? So I read again and it's melons 😭
I guess I spawned a cognitohazard xD
This comment must be contained and all the remaining copies must be purged
You can lead a man to water but you can't teach him to be a horse
You: Do you know what malaphors are?
Me: Does the pope shit in the woods?
I love these. I have made some.
While you shouldn't sweat the small stuff, it's the details that make all the difference.
Variety may be the spice of life, too many cooks spoiled the broth.
Here's one I've heard. It was from someone's boss during a meeting:
C'mon, people, this is not rocket surgery!
Don't count your chickens before you put them all in one basket
But what if I paid for the 10-piece meal?
I like how this bucket of chicken is casually thrusting for no reason.
Well duh'... Then someone else has put them in the basket already, so you're good
Put two birds in one basket?
First you get the birds stoned.
Jemandem einen Bären über den Tisch ziehen.
Wie ein Hund in die Suppe kommen.
I have a t-shirt that says "It's not rocket surgery" and depicts a surgeon working on a rocket with it's "guts" hanging out that are wires. I'm actually wearing it now, lol.
What else are you wearing? ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
Haha. I actually had a computer programming professor in university who wore a shirt that said something like; "Actually; I am a rocket surgeon". He worked on rockets.
He taught us C. That was the funniest he ever was.
My university program had a semester of Fortran, a semester of Pascal, then there was a semester long project course which wrote an assembler - required to be written in C, no prerequisite semester of C, no course teaching C directly at all - just a project using it.
I used to work at a used bookstore, and sometimes there were really excellent books that just wouldn't sell.
We would say "You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him read."
From I Love Lucy... Ricky tried giving Lucy an ultimatum in his broken English...
"Don't cross your bridges before your chickens have hatched!"
There's no use crying over fish in the sea.
*checks ocean temps and pH...*
We'll goose that cross when we come on it.
I use "not the sharpest brick in the tool shed" often.
Much fun, but IMO "we'll burn that bridge when we get to it" is a perfectly valid maxim (yes I'm aware of its roots). YMMV.
It's all water under the dam.
What's sauce for the goose is good for General Motors.
*over the dam
Yo, you might want to read the original post lol.
Fool me once is better than two in the bush
A German one:
Im Glashaus soll man nicht einen geschenkten Gaul werfen
People who live in glass houses sink ships.
Make like a tree and get the fuck outta my bar!
A rhyming spin on that...
Stoned people with loose lips sink glass ships.
Someone who lives in a white house shouldn't sink ships.
Someone who lives on a ship should sink the white house.
Kill 2 birds in the bush.
Get two birds stoned at once.
"She looks like she's been through the run of the mill..."
Almost like carrying the horse with a cart.
You're barking up the wrong metaphor.
I always liked "Not the brightest bulb in the fridge" but I've also heard "coldest frog in the pot" means stubborn, but I'm not sure that's a malaphor.
Not the sharpest bulb in the crayon shed
Let water under the bridge lie where Jesus flung it.
This is where I'd link to !Malaphors@slrpnk.net but my home base will be in limbo for a while 😬
Why don't you put an egg in your shoe and maybe add some red peppers and a bit of butter, garlic and chives?
we're peddling in the same shoe
Those who dig a pit for others, shouldn't throw rocks.
No. The bridge is too well guarded.
Thanks Bra-tac
You are indeed a wise and gracious leader, O'Neill.
Ok, roll for stealth.
8
Ok, the guards are completely oblivious that you come hither, cleverly camouflaged inside a cardboard box.
If I go out, I wanna go out with a big Swan bang.
