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Popular Idioms and Usages Part XYZ

By VJ
We are here at the end of the series, Popular Idioms and Usages. This part of the series incorporates all the idioms starting with letters X, Y, and Z. Please read the whole series from the category entry, Idioms and Usages Reference.

X-rated: With pornography, or not suitable for minors.
Year round: Throughout the year
Yell blue murder: To shout at the top of one’s voice
Yellow-bellied: Timid and cowardly
Yellow press: Sensationalist newspapers
Yellow streak: Somebody with no courage to do something
Yen: Desire
Yeoman service: Very good or great service.
Yes-man: Henchman
You are what you eat: To tell that you need to eat well to be healthy
You can’t have your cake and eat it: To mean that you can’t get everything.
You can’t unring a bell: If you have done something, it’s final
You look as if you have been dragged through a hedge backwards: Used to say that your hair needs treatment.
You reap what you sow: You get the consequences of your actions
You said it!: To say that you agree with someone completely
You are toast: To speak that you are in trouble
Young Turk: A young rebellious person
Your money or your life: To survive from me, give me your money.
Your name is mud: You are unpopular
Your sin will find you out: To mean that the consequences of your evil actions will come to you eventually
Zero hour: Time when something prominent is to happen.
Zero tolerance: An enforcement that warrants no mistakes
Zigged before you zagged: Things done in wrong order
Zip it or Zip your lip: To say to someone to be quiet.

That’s all, folks. The idioms series ends here. Hope you found the journey interesting and informative. What I lack, however, are your comments and suggestions for improvement. I expect to see many of them.

Copyright © Lenin Nair 2008

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  1. AnonymousJuly 20, 2008 at 1:25 PM

    You are what you eat: ... my Lithuanian-English may play a trick now, but I will risk to say we eat what we are in sense we live not for to eat, but eat for to live and have the fellowship. Eating (the writing in the concrete) is sharing the light that fills our hearts and thus our comments are steps of the gratitude. While Reading your post, I was not alone and grew in my understanding of English- thus you improved me - Thank you.

    ReplyDelete
  2. VJJuly 20, 2008 at 1:34 PM

    Hi Candleday, thanks a lot for the comment.

    Lenin

    ReplyDelete

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