The Absolute Best Ways To Subtly Mess With Someone's Head
"Reddit user theary18 asked: 'What is the best thing to say someone to subtly fuck with their head?'"
Sometimes it's fun to toy with someone.
Especially if it's an enemy or a loved one who simply deserves a good ribbing.
Some cryptic sentences can send anyone into a tailspin.
And oh the fun that can be had.
You have to be as vague as possible and as sincere.
You have to sell the sincerity. That's vital!
And then just watch them implode.
Redditor theary18 wanted to hear about the most creative ways to throw somebody off their game, so they asked:
"What is the best thing to say to someone to subtly f**k with their head?"
I love to come up behind someone and say "I can't believe they would treat you this way. I got you girl!"
Then I scurry away.
Tee-hee...
It's YOU!
For Me GIF by Liz Huett Giphy"Just tack on the phrase 'given your history' to any question you ask someone."
"Are you sure you want another drink? Given your history?"
"Do you mind driving? Given your history?"
hamletreset
Mean Kids...
"I moved to my elementary school in the 5th grade. Mid-year, a boy came up to me and said, 'I really thought you were gonna be somebody.' I'm now 45 and I'm still like, what the f**k was he talking about?"
NicklePlatedSkull
"Likely something they heard a parent say to someone. Kids love to repeat the dumb stuff you say the next day at school."
itsallgoodman2002
"All jokes aside he probably thought you were someone else. I've done the same things countless times and it's happened to me a few."
Download_more_ramram
"I would interpret this as this kid hearing there's gonna be a 'new kid' and then their imagination ran wild as to who this new star is going to be, that it will be like in some kid movie or something, but you turned out to be just another kid student."
i_was_planned
I Like You
"I don't get why other people don't like you."
Dependent_Main2643
"Another variant is..."
"I don’t care what everyone else is saying. I think you’re great!"
"They’ll take it as a compliment at first but then they’ll think about it and it’ll eat away at them."
Oh-Cool-Story-Bro
"A guy I work with says this time to me every time I help him 'I don’t care what everyone else says about you you’re alright. Literally everyone else. We did a poll.' XD guy says some crazy s**t. When he started he tried to convince us he was a flat earther. He just likes fucking with people."
ThreeBeatles
Rumors
“'I heard about you.'"
ignorantpigeon
"Whenever I hear this I always respond with 'if it’s all good, it’s all lies.' Usually shows my sense of humor and if it is bad things they heard it usually lightens the mood."
ElApolloLoco
"Years ago I worked at a cafe and function venue which was sold after a few years to a new catering company. The first time I met the new restaurant manager I introduced myself and she exclaimed 'Oh, you’re winoforever!' and I was a bit weirded out. Then not long later I met the new owner and she also said 'Oh, you’re winoforever!' I still wonder twenty years later what they’d both heard about me."
winoforever_slurp_
Problems
Drunk Party Girl GIF Giphy"Go up to someone at a party and say: 'I just want you to know that personally, I have no problem with you being here.'"
LuketheMook
"I once got drunk and effectively said that to a girl at a wedding. 'I don't care what everyone else thinks, I always liked you' or something like that."
Supersnazz
Parties are the perfect setting for these shenanigans.
Especially with the drinkers.
But get them at least semi-sober.
I got You
Okaay What GIF by ABC Network Giphy"If you are chatting with someone and another person walks up look at them and say 'I just want you to know that I was defending you' then turn and walk off. It's a good 2fer."
could_use_a_snack
Hush
"'We know, but don't worry, we'll keep it a secret.'"
ch3rrycsmos_
"A friend in high school (actually still a current friend) said something similar to me and it definitely f**ked with my head. 'You know you're not fooling anyone, right?' He wouldn't elaborate and it took me the rest of the day to figure out he was f**king with me. As a guy with imposter syndrome, especially as a teen, that had me turned for a bit."
ablackcloudupahead
You Again
"If it’s someone you interact with repeatedly, always introduce yourself as if you’ve never met before."
Stillwater215
"I keep doing this to a guy I see very occasionally. He's a friend of my sister-in-law, but I've introduced myself to him at least four times. Right now, I'm trying to picture his face and I totally can't, so if I see him again, I'll introduce myself again. He remembers me though. And I don't have this issue with anyone else, I just can't remember this guy's face for some reason."
KrtekJim
Big Mouth
"You really need to brush your teeth."
setthepinnacle
"Somebody jokingly left a message on the 'tip' line that said 'Take a breath mint.'"
"I'm like 90% sure it was just the first thing that came to his head but it f**ked with me for weeks. I was self-conscious when talking to people, being close to them with my mouth open, and I'd constantly be brushing longer/harder taking mouthwash a couple extra times a day, and using mints."
ToFaceA_god
Head Issues
Think About It GIF by Identity Giphy"Give all your friends a few dollars to compliment their hat if they’re not wearing one. When 50 people insist you’re wearing a hat, you start to think you’re wearing a hat. It will drive them insane."
Stillwater215
Hats off for that last one. That's harmless but devious.
Do you have any tips to add? Let us know in the comments below.
Do all mothers go to the say mom school or something? Because they seem to share the same advice or go on the same platitudes, don't they?
Here's an idea.
Maybe they're just older, have more experience, and are trying to keep us from being dumbasses in public. At least, that's what I think.
I'm definitely grateful for my mother's advice—it's saved me more than once—and it seems many out there are too. And they all seem to have heard the same things from their mothers, too.
Any of these sound familiar? They probably do, and we heard all about them after Redditor lame_excuses asked the online community,
"What are some things all moms say?"
"I'll go first..."
"I'll go first: 'So if your friend jumped off a cliff would you jump off too?"
lame_excuses
Okay, my mother did not say this, but all my friends' mothers did.
"We have fun."
"My mom always made me put on a coat when we went outside, even if I wasn't cold, simply because she was cold."
"Now that I'm an adult, she no longer tells me this but instead I complain about being cold and ask, indignantly, why no one told me to put in a coat."
"We have fun."
Louis_Louise
I want a documentary crew to follow you both around. It'd be hilarious.
"I credit George Carlin for all of these."
"When you lose something."
- Have you tried looking for it?
- Have you looked everywhere?
- Well, it didn't just get up and walk away.
"I credit George Carlin for all of these."
Mahaloth
George Carlin knew what he was talking about. RIP.
"You know Glynis? She's your aunt's mother-in-law's close friend. Anyway, she died last week."
VanderlyleNovember
Every.
Single.
Time.
"I have eyes..."
"I have eyes in the back of my head."
"My mom used to say that to my sister and I so we wouldn't be sneaky behind her back. One day she was washing the dishes and I came up behind her with my two fingers and poked her right where I assumed her back eyes would be. She shouted, 'Ouch!' I believed her for years!!"
vkyklynn
I was convinced of this too! Damn, my mother was good.
"I had some friends over..."
"I had some friends over when I was a teenager, and I bet them I could get my mom to say the word 'food.'"
"Hey, mom, what's for dinner?"
"Worked every time."
jcpmojo
You both clearly planned this!
"When at the billing counter..."
"When at the billing counter every mom has the maternal instinct to say - 'Just stay in the line, I need to go grab a few more things.'"
AlertMongoose2021
This is my mother.
Oh God.
How many times have I dealt with this?!
"It's because..."
“It’s because you didn’t drink enough water."
beautifullydamaged_
BUT I DO!!
FILTHY LIES!!!
"If you have siblings..."
"If you have other siblings and they’re trying to yell at you they will call you by all your other siblings' names before they get to yours. Usually starting with the oldest and working their way backwards."
Trex_N_Truex
Good thing my family was small!
"My Mum used to use it all the time..."
"'Soon.'" An indeterminate time frame from 5 minutes to several hours. My Mum used to use it all the time to deflect stupid questions like 'When is dinner?'"
"Answer: she always, always served it around 6 pm."
zerbey
It's true! My mother would do this – and still does this. And we definitely don't eat as early as that!
Confirmed: All mothers meet for the annual mother convention to say all–and I do mean ALL–of these things to their kids.
Anything missing, though? Feel free to tell us more in the comments below!
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There are few things more annoying in conversation than people who say the words, "That's just my opinion!"
Let me be perfectly clear: opinions need to be based on fact and actual experience. Reading conspiracy theories online and spending time on a dark corner of YouTube doesn't make you an "expert." Not now... not ever.
When I hear someone say the words, "That's just my opinion!" I mentally brace myself because I just know what I'm about to hear is going to be ridiculous.
People told us all about the phrases that bother the hell out of them after Redditor SpankBankManager asked the online community,
"What phrases do you wish people would stop using?"
"I'm a teacher."
"I'm a teacher. The next admin that calls us 'rockstars' or 'superheroes' is getting punched in the face."
Polloco
That must be very grating, especially during the pandemic!
"At any sort of conference..."
"At any sort of conference/gathering/presentation: 'How're you all doing today?!? C'mon, I know you can answer louder than that! HOW ARE YOU ALL DOING TODAY?!'"
"Instant resentment every time."
avokato_
I concur.
I attended a conference once where the main speaker did this several times in the span of thirty minutes as he announced different initiatives.
Such a headache.
"I really hate..."
"I really hate it when people say "no offense". It usually means they are going to say something offensive but use it so they can't get criticized for it. Also When People Use A Capital Letter For Literally Every Word."
Berrend69
They might say they meant no offense but that's never actually the case. Oh, they definitely meant it.
"The sudden popularity..."
"The sudden popularity (and therefore overuse) of the term gaslighting. What used to be a somewhat obscure reference is now everywhere, especially here on Reddit."
twizzlerbreath
I can see how this can get annoying. Words do have meanings and those meanings can be diluted over time.
"The more appropriate thing to say..."
"Someone saying to a teenager, 'These are the best years of your life!' I am in my mid-40s now and most people my age remember high school as horrible and awkward."
"The more appropriate thing to say is, "Hang in there kid! I promise life gets better. Just get through adolescence the best you can."
mkmhyk
I definitely don't miss high school and resented anyone who told me I would.
"Now when I hear it..."
"Only good vibes here."
"I have an uncle who always says this. It used to crush me because he was the only other adult I could talk to when things were bad at home. We couldn't come to him with bad news ever."
"Now when I hear it it's just toxic BS."
Nspired1
It IS toxic BS. When you hear stuff like that, you know you can't share anything openly or honestly.
"When my manager says..."
"When my manager says, 'I can't control what the night shift does.' Every day I walk into a mess from them and every day nothing gets done about it."
BostonStrongCQB241
Why can't people just take responsibility for their own work? When they don't, it definitely affects other people.
"By this metric..."
"Everyone is entitled to their own opinion."
"By my best understanding, an opinion needs to be founded on both experience and knowledge; a blind person cannot have the opinion that the sky is red."
"By this metric, some people's thoughts don't even qualify as opinions to me."
SMOGGIE
What's that saying?
You're entitled to your own opinion. Not your own facts.
"It's almost always used..."
"Everything happens for a reason."
"It's almost always used at a time where it offers no comfort. Someone unexpectedly dies, a child gets cancer, etc. There is no bigger profound "reason" for their suffering that is going to negate the pain/grief."
yabunsandthighs
Few sayings are as callous as this one. And people just say it without thinking!
"The word 'hack' in general - it meant getting a system to do something it wasn't designed to do. It might have been good or evil, it might have been clever or dirty, but whatever it was it was still a hack."
"Then the media got hold of it..."
"Guessing someone's password is not a hack."
The misuse of the word "hack" has long entered common parlance. And don't get me started on "life hack."
Well, going through all of these was annoying as hell. I'm having flashbacks to every single time someone said any of these to my face.
Have some phrases you hate? Feel free to tell us more in the comments below!
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People Break Down Common Sayings That Actually Have A Second Part Everyone Ignores
Please try not to be too salty when you reach the end of this article and realize how many times these "common sayings" have been chopped up and taken out of context so they can be used to manipulate you.
I said try. Nobody is going to blame you...
Reddit user "RedditCredits" asked:
"What sayings have a second part that everybody ignores?"
... so, like, does anybody else notice how the meaning is often changed by the rest of the phrase?
Jack
Tea Shade GIFGiphy"Like, 'Jack of all trades, master of none...' "
"There's more to that phrase. The rest goes "is often times better than a master of one.' " - redditcredits
"This one is especially curious case, because the original phrase started not even as a saying, just a description of a person. As in 'John is a real Jack of all trades' (i.e. John can do many things)."
"Then someone decided to append with their personal judgement that specializing is better - basically being shady by saying if he's good at lots of things then he can't be GREAT at anything."
"So we got 'Jack of all trades, master of none' "
"And then someone else added their personal judgment that being well-rounded is better so we got 'Jack of all trades, master of none, if often times better than a master of one.' "
"Soon, it will be: 'Jack of all trades, master of none, better than master of one, but not really, but yes really, but not if you think about it, but especially if you think about it...' " - suvlub
Mediocrity
The Incredibles Teacher Life GIFGiphy" 'Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery...'
" The second part: 'That mediocrity can pay to greatness.' "
"That last clause really drives home a slightly different point than we might be used to." - ZombieSquirrel
"So basically that quote is a roast? Damn." - justwalking_683
"Didnt know about this second part, definitely changes how I look at the quote. Thanks for sharing." - SmilingWatermelon
Great Minds
Emily Blunt Love GIF by The Animal Crackers MovieGiphy"Great minds think alike - but simple minds seldom differ" - DGDadbod
"What's the point of this phrase? It's set up as a differentiation between great and simple minds, but ends up saying they're the exact same." - 00PT
"It's saying that consensus isn't a guarantee that your idea is a good one."
"The first half 'great minds think alike' is usually used to suggest that consensus means your idea is good."
"For instance, I believe we should get ice cream and so does my friend, we're thinking alike, great minds think alike, thus we have great minds and getting ice cream is a good idea."
"However the second half indicates that consensus is meaningless if the people involved are stupid."
"For instance I'm drunk and think we should go try to fight that cop, and my buddy is drunk and thinks we should go try to fight that cop, we have consensus, but we're both simple drunk idiots, so that consensus doesn't matter. Still a bad idea." - finance_n_fitness
The Love Before The Fury
Angry Weight Loss GIF by BounceGiphy" 'Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned' "
"William Congreve a 17th century playwright had this become his most famous quote. However, the actual line from his 1697 play, The Mourning Bride, goes:"
" 'Heaven has no rage like love to hatred turned / Nor hell a fury like a woman scorned.' " - SlapDaBacon
"It's all about the 'love to hatred turned' part."
"The way I interpret it is if if you wrong a stranger they'll be pissed off, but not dramatically. If you wrong somebody you're close to, who loves you, the anger can be much greater because of the betrayal." - pineapplespy
"If you betray a woman who loves you, she can possess anger more powerful than any found in heaven or hell. She had to love you first."
"It was never meant to be about the girl you only went on one date with." - shastaxc
Apples
Throwing Episode 2 GIF by The X-FilesGiphy"A lot of people say 'there's a (few) bad apple(s)' but they forget that they 'spoil the whole bunch.' "
"I've heard it used more and more to defend against regulation, particularly in the financial and law enforcement sectors." - GundamMaker
"This."
"When a cop is caught doing something atrocious, they always say 'he was just one bad apple.' But the point is that when the police force tolerates those bad apples and hides their misdeeds, it corrupts the whole force."
"The bad apple spoils the bunch and needs to be removed proactively!" - poppop_n_the_attic
"This is the one that gets used the most without the second half and it drastically changes the meaning." - AltharaD
"To be clear, this is how apples really work. When an apple goes bad, it releases a gas that makes other nearby apples also go bad."
"So literally if you have a bunch of apples and one of them goes bad, it will taint all the others if it's not caught and removed immediately. If it's allowed to stay, the whole bunch is ruined and dangerous."
"That's what the saying is meant to convey." - Oudeis16
Money = Evil?
Dave Chappelle Reaction GIFGiphy"People usually think it's money itself that's evil, so you'll commonly hear 'Money is the root of all evil.' "
"But the actual phrase is saying that it is the love of money that's the root of all evil." - PuzzledInside123
"The context around the quote, from 1 Timothy:"
" 'But they that will be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction and perdition.' "
" 'For the love of money is the root of all evil: which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.' " - jalabi99
"Money itself isn't good or evil; it's just an inanimate object. But love of money -- i.e., a person obsessed with money… well, I hope that's obvious." - brndm
Redditors Recount The Wedding Objections They Witnessed | George Takei’s Oh Myyy
Weddings are supposed to be all about love and celebration, right? But let's be honest, weddings are stressful. According to a recent Zola survey of 500 enga...Carpe Diem
Giphy" 'Carpe diem, quam minimum credula postero' "
"Translation: 'Seize the day, trusting as little as possible in the future.' "
"People generally take it as meaning live for the moment, where as the quote was to inspire the taking of every opportunity to work hard to ensure your future is stable, so not living for the moment, but planning for the future" - cpsutcliffe
"The translation from Latin is closer to 'pluck' the day (as in pick fruit while it is ripe.) Basically, stop and smell the roses while you can because the future isn't guaranteed no matter how hard you work today." - EducatedDeath
About Hipocrisy
" 'Judge not that you be not judged.' "
"Everyone takes this to mean that you should never, ever, under any circumstances, judge someone. So they ignore atrocious behavior like 'Yes that other person could be cheating on their spouse, but we can't judge. Not our place.' "
"The second half of the verse says, 'for by what standard you judge, you will be judged.' "
"The entire warning is about hypocrisy. In another words, don't judge your neighbor for being an adulterer if you happen to have a side piece of your own."
"If you judge your neighbor for something then be ready to be judged by that same standard." - agreeingstorm9
A Little Knowledge
Think About It Reaction GIF by IdentityGiphy" 'A little learning is a dangerous thing' "
"It's the first line of a poem by Alexander Pope. The rest of the first stanza is: "
" 'Drink deep or taste not the Pierian spring' "
" 'There shallow draughts intoxicated the brain' "
" 'And drinking largely sobers us again.' "
"The poem is criticizing superficial knowledge (reddits speciality...) Not actual education. Btw the Pierian spring is from mythology and source of knowledge." - ikonoqlast
Opium's Not Necessarily Always Bad, Though...
Rise Up Hbo GIF by Vice Principals Giphy" 'Religion is the opiate of the masses' "
"The full text is more like: 'Religion is the opium of the people. It is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of our soulless conditions.' "
"Today, opium is regarded as a stupefying narcotic, so most people interpret it as 'religion makes people dumb,' but that's not what Marx meant."
"In his day, opium was the only real pain-killer there was. In other words, religion was the thing that helped oppressed people tolerate their oppression."
"Marx meant as a criticism of religion, since it forestalled what he felt was a necessary overthrow of their oppressors."
"His issue was that he felt religion allowed people to be complacent and accepting of oppression, not that it made people unintelligent." - jemenake
Human Mistakes
Starz Professor GIF by Power Book II: GhostGiphy"In Latin: 'Erare humanum est,' which means: 'to make mistakes is to be human.'
"But the second part of the phrase is 'Perceverum Diabolitas,' which roughly translates to 'to continue making them is devilish' everyone forgets the second part!"
"I hear a version of it in English that ends with 'to forgive is divine' but it dismisses any accountability. The original phrase does not, it's all about the accountability of not making that 'mistake' again." - Antorac
Weave A Better Web
s reactions web GIFGiphy" 'Oh what a tangled web we weave...' is a phrase I hear often. I sometimes hear it with the second half of the line: 'When first we practice to deceive' "
"But the next part is so often omitted that most people don't understand the whole meaning:"
" 'But how vastly we've improved our style / When we've practiced for a while.' "
"Yeah, it's basically saying we get better at lying with practice." - bp_516
Buzzkill
Nbc Brooklyn 99 GIF by Brooklyn Nine-NineGiphy" 'Eat, drink, and be merry' "
"The rest of the sentence is: 'for tomorrow we die.' which is a major buzzkill, not a warm holiday greeting." - miraakthecasbah
Bliss
Sad Face GIFGiphy"People are familiar with the expression, 'Ignorance is bliss.' However, the full sentence is:"
" 'Where ignorance is bliss, 'tis folly to be wise.' "
"In other words, it's not that it's good to be uneducated; rather, there's not always a benefit in knowing certain disturbing pieces of information."
"From the 1742 poem 'Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College,' by Thomas Gray." - ChannelingWhiteLight
Toxic Honey
toxic britney spears GIFGiphy" 'Revenge is sweet' "
"It comes from this:"
" 'Revenge is sweet, a toxic honey that corrodes the soul.' - Sun Tzu. It's not, at all, supposed to celebrate revenge." - Al-Alecto
Does knowing the rest of these phrases change anything about how you've understood them? Sound off.
Most languages come with a lot of weird idioms and sayings. Where they began, no one really knows. Yet they're passed down from generation to generation, and many times the people who say it don't actually know what it means.
These can get super confusing. I would say to not think too hard about it, but this is Reddit after all. Bubbrub13 asked:
What's a popular saying you don't really understand?
These next few sayings really don’t make sense when it comes to what they actually mean.
The explanation makes a lot more sense.
“When someone has a "laundry list" of things to do. With the implication that there is a lot to do.
Who has ever made a list of their laundry?”
“The idiom comes from the advent of laundry services. Basically, before people had washing machines in their houses, you'd ship your clothes off to the laundry service to have them washed and folded.
You'd include a list so that you knew what they gave them. Nowadays you still see laundry lists in fancy hotels!”
Sometimes the full saying gets shortened over the years.
clam GIFGiphy“Happy as a clam.
Why are clams happy?"
“The full phrase is ‘happy as a clam at high tide’. Because at low tide a person with a shovel can cause the clam to become soup."
You really need the whole phrase for it to make sense.
"The proof is in the pudding."
“It's a shortened version of the phrase.
The proof of the pudding is in the eating.
Or in other words to know how good some things are, you have to try them.
(source- NPR)”
Hardcore, indeed.
"’The whole nine yards’. I know what it means, but don't grasp where the meaning originated. I have been told that it refers to making of a nice dress or a wedding dress, which would use the entire nine yards in a bolt of fabric. But that's just apocryphal. And does the term have any relation to the phrase ‘dressing to the nines?’”
“It's from World War 2. Specifically refers to the length of ammo chains on aircraft were 27 feet long. So if you fired all bullets at a target, you gave them the full 9 yards.
source- pretty sure I heard Dan Carlin mention it in Hardcore History”
So far, it seems like a lot of these come from way back when, during times where they made a lot more sense. But these next few are the real head scratchers.
I don’t get this one either.
Comforting 30 Rock GIFGiphy"’There, there.’
I understand it's said when consoling someone in pain, distraught or just plain sad. Letting them know you are there. What I don't understand is the use of the word ‘there’, twice.
I'd understand consoling with ‘I'm here, I'm here’.
I'd understand consoling with ‘it's going to be ok, it's going to be ok’.
But...there...said twice? What does it mean?”
This one means the opposite of what you think it does.
"’Got my work cut out for me.’
I've been told that this means that your task/job will be difficult. It sounds like it should mean that your work will be easier to do. I don't get it.”
“Yeah, the original meaning was from tailoring clothes, where the material would literally be cut out and prepared ahead of time, and then you have ‘your work cut out for you’.
So it means you have work ready to go and clearly you'll be busy and not just sitting around waiting for stuff to happen, but it doesn't necessarily imply that the work is especially hard.
But for most people having work in the backlog is arduous enough that it carries some implied difficulty, which then gets attached as a connotation to the saying.”
No worries.
"’I slept like a baby.’
It understand it is supposed to mean that you slept well, but almost very baby I have ever been around wakes up crying every couple hours.”
“It means you slept without worries as babies don't have to worry about anything. For us that translates to a better sleep because of less stress.”
I have been saying so many of these without even knowing where they came from.
Well that’s awkward.
Glove Penetration GIFGiphy“A friend is a phlebotomist (they're the ones who draw your blood when you get LA work done). She had a staff member who was not a native English speaker.
My friend was walking from her office to the waiting room when she overheard the staff member with a patient. My friend's eyes widened and she asked the staff member to come to her office after the client left. Here's their conversation.
F--Friend S--Staff Member
F: So I heard you chatting with your patient before the draw. What were you chatting about?
S: Well, I told him to have a seat. Then after he confirmed his name and blood work I told him I had to grab a new latex glove because one was torn, so I told him I'd be right with him.
F: Yes, but what did you say exactly?
S: Oh! No glove no love!
F: (trying desperately to contain a grin) And do you know what 'No glove no love means'?
S: Yess...
F: Well, what do YOU think it means?
My friend spent the next few minutes explaining that the phrase means 'no condom, no sex', to the absolute terror of her staff member.
S: But..but...I say that to EVERYBODY. OH MY GOD.
aaaaannnnd scene."
Very different from its actual meaning.
“‘Pull yourself up by the bootstraps’ is used to mean you should put the work in and get things done despite hardships, but originally it was used to describe an impossible task.
“That one bugs me the most, it literally means you cannot accomplish this alone, you need help from others and it has gotten co-opted to mean you just have to try harder.
Now granted the people saying this don't usually want those they are saying it to, to actually succeed.”
On accident or on purpose?
"’On accident’ as in ‘I did that thing on accident’
For my entire 50 years, it's always been ‘by accident’ but now all of a sudden I am hearing people say ‘on accident’ and it makes no sense grammatically at all.”
“Most likely formed based on analogy with the opposite adverbial 'on purpose'.”
Well I definitely learned a thing or two today. It’s interesting how we go about saying all of these phrases, without actually knowing what they mean.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go and try to sleep like a baby.