Do you know someone who drinks like a fish and sweats like a pig? Actually, fish don’t drink very much, although they appear to, and pigs don’t have sweat glands. Nonetheless, we continue to say and write, drinks like a fish and sweats like a pig because they are embedded clichés in our language.
The earliest clichés were printing plates, or stereotypes, made first from wood, then clay, and, finally, cast from metal. The figurative sense of clichés and stereotypes arose later because these plates were often reused and were impervious to change.
One of the ironies of language is that striking figures of speech and vivid comparisons soon become clichés precisely because they initially express an idea so well. These phrases catch on, are picked up by a host of people, and quickly become trite or dead as a doornail (itself a cliché) as their originality and cleverness vanish into thin air (another cliché).
Like is a preposition you can’t refuse in our language. Complete each likely expression, and you’ll be in like Flynn (who was a real 1940s New York politician, not the handsome movie actor Earl Flynn), not out like a light. Answers repose after each cluster of questions.
Solve the first 15 posers with animal kingdom answers. I hope you’ll take to this quiz like a duck to water.
| 1. bleeding like | 9. a memory like |
| 2. breed like | 10. rolls off him like |
| 3. clever like | 11. runs around like |
| 4. dropping like | 12. runs like |
| 5. eats like | 13. soars like |
| 6. fighting like | 14. watch like |
| 7. He looks awful; he looks like | 15. works like |
| 8. March comes in like and goes out like |
Answers
- a stuck pig 2. bunnies / rabbits 3. a fox 4. flies 5. a bird / horse / pig 6. cats and dogs 7. something the cat dragged in 8. a lion / a lamb 9. an elephant(‘s) 10. water off a duck’s back a chicken with its head . cut off 12. a deer 13. an eagle 14. a hawk 15. a dog
Here’s more of my likely story. May this part of the game fit you like a glove and make you come out smelling like a rose. If you work like a Trojan, this quiz will work like a charm. Otherwise, it will go over like a lead balloon.
| 1. avoid it like | 21. a mind like |
| 2. blew up like | 22. The news spread like |
| 3. came on like | 23. runs like |
| 4. cried like | 24. sank like |
| 5. dropped it like | 25. selling like |
| 6. finding the lost earring is like | 26. shaking like |
| 7. fix it like | 27. She looks great; she looks like |
| 8. Getting an answer out of him is like | 28. He looks awful; he looks like |
| 9. grew like | 29. slept like |
| 10. I need it like | 30. smokes like |
| 11. hit him like | 31. spends money like |
| 12. howl like | 32. sticks out like |
| 13. keeps coming back like | 33. stole away like |
| 14. I know this place like | 34. swears like |
| 15. lie like | 35. They passed like |
| 16. lit up like | 36. They’re so alike they’re like |
| 17. live like | 37. took it like |
| 18. make out like | 38. wails like |
| 19. melts like | 39. went off like |
| 20. a memory like | 40. went on and on like |
Answers
- the plague 2. a balloon 3. gangbusters 4. a baby 5. a hot potato 6. looking for a needle in a haystack 7. new 8. pulling teeth / getting blood from a stone 9. Topsy / a weed 10. a hole in the head 11. ton of bricks 12. a banshee 13. a bad penny 14. the back of my hand 15. a rug 16. a Christmas tree 17. a king 18. a bandit 19. butter in my mouth 20. a sieve 21. a steel trap 22. wildfire 23. the wind 24. a stone 25. hotcakes 26. a leaf 27. a million dollars 28. death warmed over 29. a baby / a log / a top 30. a chimney 31. water / it’s going out of style 32. a sore thumb 33. a thief in the night 34. a trouper (not trooper) / sailor 35. ships in the night 36. two peas in a pod 37. a man 38. a banshee 39. clockwork 40. a broken record