Idioms with numbers

Well, there are idioms and idioms and we all use them freely in our speech and writing. Here are just a few with numbers. You can add your choice of idiom with numbers and make a sentence with it to highlight the meaning.

• Two left feet means that one is a bad dancer or having poor coordination with the movements of limbs.  The Cambridge meaning: to move in a very awkward way when dancing. 
  Usage: Looks like Jimmy has two left feet, he already looks embarrassed dancing at his wedding.

  General Knowledge: The Man With Two Left Feet is a book by the British author P. G. Wodehouse.

  This idiom was first recorded in 1915.  Be clumsy, as in I’ll never get the hang of this dance; I’ve got two left feet. This expression conjures up an image of feet that are not symmetrical, as left and right are, therefore causing imbalance or stumbling. ( Dictionary.com)

• On cloud nine: When someone is very happy about something good that has happened. To be on top of the world. To feel exhilarated.

         Usage: Lila was on cloud nine when she heard that she had been chosen for the film.

         General Knowledge: There are many storybooks with the name Cloud Nine. There are a few movies too that go by the name of  Cloud Nine. The latest being a Disney movie in 2014 which was a sports drama.

         This idiom started coming into use in the 1950’s.

• At the eleventh hour is when something happens at the last minute. Just in the nick of time.

Usage: The concert was cancelled at the eleventh hour due to unrest in the city.

         General Knowledge: This idiom might have originated from the Bible where it was first used in Mathew 20:9. The passage tells about workers who took off at the eleventh hour of a twelve-hour workday, received as much pay as those who worked for the whole day.

         Eleventh Hour is a book written by S. Hussain Zaidi on the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks and nine years hence. There are more story-books with the title The Eleventh         Hour.

The Eleventh Hour is also a 2007 documentary movie on the state of the natural environment produced by Leonardo Dicaprio. There are more movies with the title           The Eleventh Hour.

• Catch 22 is a no-win situation.  A situation where one cannot escape, feels caught, has no control over.

Usage: He was caught in a catch 22 situation when his pup ran away with his glasses.                    Now he needed glasses to look for them.

General Knowledge: This idiom was first coined in Joseph Heller’s war novel  Catch           22. There are movies with the same name too.

• Kill two birds with one stone where two goals are achieved with one action. To solve two problems with one action.

Usage: I cycle down to my work, killing two birds with one stone, where I get my exercise as well as cut down my commuting cost.

General Knowledge: I do wonder why such a positive phrase would have something like the word kill in it? And to think that a stone would be used to kill two birds seems rather unlikely. Whatever be the reason of the existence of this phrase, it seems to have it’s origins in the 1600’s. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, its earliest citation goes back to 1655-1656 where exchange of views about free will between the philosopher Thomas Hobbes and the Anglican Bishop John Bramhall, tells us a bit about where we got this idiom from. And it sure has nothing to do with violence or attacking birds. It goes like this: “T. H. thinks to kill two birds with one stone, and satisfy two arguments with one answer.”

There are no two ways about it that idioms with numbers are a dime a dozen and putting them down here is not as easy as one-two-three.

Hope you do enjoy reading this. I shall keep adding more here. If you wish to contribute, please do go ahead.