Right, an Idiom has a situational background and significance. Then what is the difference in it to a proverb or a phrase?
thank you for teacher can more iam small English
This is a very good knowledgeble story. And the title Green Shots is encouraglble means every dranknight there will be a beautiful morning. I also thanks for beautiful idomatic story, what an example. I’ll must say this story is not only well written, but the use of simple words make easy to understandable and positive attitude make it best. Thanks a lot.
Dear Alan,
Thank you very much for this write up, what a wounder-full idiomatic expression with egg. Egg in my native language is call “ukohor”. we have an idiomatic expression like this; no person know the egg that will hatch a male chick. — Meaning that so many things can not be known about the further of a person.
Please, kindly differential idiom,proverb and an ordinary philosophical expression?
Thank you and God bless
Your student
Ohwoemma
Thank you Alan i like the way you are teaching idioms like eating candy.
thanks for the article, keep sending it, i o want to know the meaning of to suck.
hi everyon:
this was a nice and enjoyable text to read.I guess almost for every idiom mentioned there we have an equivalent in persian but I only mention one of the most common . for this idiom "teach one’s grandmother to suck eggs "we say something like " turn somersault in front of juggler "and another one which makes sense only if you are familiar with Loghman the philosopher who was a very wise man and that is " teach wisdom to Loghman "
bye bye
Hi Alan,
The only idiom I know is ‘to put all your eggs in one basket’ and the rest of the
idioms are new to me.
Most of the time ,I would use “I encourage you to ask questions” when talking with
my friends or students.
But if I were to say to my friends “I would ‘egg you on’ to ask questions”,I wonder
they do understand what I mean?
Is this idiom ‘egg you on’ use in formal or informal way?
Thanks.
Regards,
Lee
It’s nice to learn different idioms using the word egg. But to tell you honestly, haven’t heard the idiom…“egg on” is this a common idiom before? Anyway, I’m glad to learn a new word ‘ovoid’. God bless us all.
Hi Len_Iman,
Thanks for your comments. ‘Egg on’ is perhaps a little old fashioned nowadays, a bit like me!
Alan
Thank a lot.
It is worth to learn such a idiomatic expression so that we can produce a natural English or a sentence like you, native speaker. But it is too long to read one sitting in computer .
Aung Moe
Hi Alan,
I burst out laughing at your comment, because it was very good.
My question: if this very good verb “egg on” a little old fashioned nowadays, a bit like you and me also. What do you recommend instead of it.
bustle sb to do sth; stimulate sb to do sth; encourage sth in sb or another else?
Many thanks:
Kati Svaby
Thank you so much ALan, I find your newsletters very useful for my practicing English. Thanks again.
the article is great, I wonder where you people come up with all this amazing ideas in terms of topics…keep it up, I’ll follow closely
Dear Alan,
I have to confess to you that from time to time I read your last comments on something. So I have made a serious mistake because I didn’t notice that I came across the third page of your newsletter. I reacted only the verb " egg sb on sth/ to do sth" Now I found out its best synonym can be “urge sb to do sth”, can’t it?
Of course I read the whole newsletter and I would like to answer it, because it is very nice letter - than always.
So I can say about myself: I am left with egg on my face.
worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-egg2.htm
Best wishes and I am sorry for my mistake.
Kati Svaby
Hello Alan,
Thanks for the definition:
Collocation is an expression, a group of words that have developed together over time and have become a standard.
for exp: do me a favour
Idiom invariably has a history as to why certain words are used to express an idea or thought but it is not possible to decipher the meaning from the words.
Idiom:I am no spring chicken= I am not young.
The green shoots are the buds which appear on the branches in Spring. And the brown boughs becomes greenish and in few days green. I like the spring. The nature is reborn and “every bird chooses a mate” -than the Hungarian folk-song says. But not only the birds if I remember well, and I remember that every spring I used to fall in love. Today I don’t fell in love of course but I am very happy about it, me also. The beauty of the spring fascinates me.
My photos about my spring-garden in 2011.
english-test.net/forum/ftopic46595-2730.html
Symbol of the new life is an egg.
There is a common saying: Which was sooner the egg or the hen?
Nest egg= Money that you keep safe to use for some future.
Good egg= very likeable person
Bad egg = is a stinky egg or a rotter = who is a worthless man.
Who has egg all over their mouth=a person who isn’t careful eater
He’s been left with egg on his face = sth you have done has left you looking foolish and stupid.
Don’t put all you eggs one basket = Don’t risk making everything dependant on only one thing.
Egg shaped face =the whole head looks ovoid or oval. It is characteristic of very ‘intelligent’ people so we call them: ‘eggheads’. In Hungarian we say: clever egg
over egg = to spoil something
teach your grandmother to suck eggs= in Hungarian we say: The egg want to teach the hen.
egg on= encourage sb to do sth
XXXX
Similar one’s in Hungarian. There are lot so I have to stop myself from adding only few ones:
They are as like as two eggs. I know in English you say: They are as like as two peas in a pod.
He keeps quiet than the brooder on its eggs.
The broken egg can’t be soldered together even by the smith.= The deadly disease can’t be cured.
Many thanks:
Kati Svaby[/u]
as usual you enrich my language fortune a lot.
many thanks
Alan Townend, Great to receive such kind of expressions with their meaning and usage. Thank You… I have no questions or any doubts about idioms which you talked about. But its nice to learn them. Yeah! once I tried to teach my grandmother to suck eggs, And you know Alan, What happened ? Any Guesses? What was the scene which I gone through? I still feel shy, shame and pity, on myself. It kills me everytime, whenever I think about it.
It is an interesting article. English is AWESOME!