Tuesday, September 9, 2008

I Could Spit Nails!

My new favorite saying prompted me to list all the commonly-used phrases and metaphors I could think of that involve some aspect of woodworking. Here's what I came up with:
These phrases have been around for a while and are as worn out as 30-year-old band saw tires, so I feel it's our duty to coin some new ones for the good of the craft. If you come up with one, feel free to share. I mean, surely we couldn't have exhausted all possible woodworking clichés.

(Knock on wood.)

18 comments:

Litcritter said...

Don't forget the proverbial loose screw.

Anonymous said...

Working blue....

She's a carpenter's dream...
Flat as a board and easy to @#$^%

Anonymous said...

And then there are all of the sayings involving wood structures like barns(big as), and barrels (round as a) et al.

Anonymous said...

How about...
Dumb as a bag of hammers

mdhills said...

When you've got a hammer, everything looks like a (thumb)nail?

Anonymous said...

Blockhead

Skinny as a rail

Sharp as a tack

Straight as a 1x3 from Home Depot. What? Oh nevermind.

will said...

.. wrenched my back

.. hewn out of mountains of guilt

.. Hoist by your own petard

.. whet my appetite

.. mighty oaks from tiny acorns grow

.. Bend like a willow or break like an oak

.. Spare the rod and spoil the child

.. eat my dust

.. Beam me up, Scotty

Vic Hubbard said...

Keep working and you'll rout it out....I'll have to keep mulling this one over. By now you should know I'm OCD. Why would you want to do this to me?:D

Unknown said...

There's always:

That's cut and dried

Kari Hultman said...

I'm impressed! I've now added a few of these sayings to my repertoire.

Roger said...

Tried & true.
Varnish over.

Anonymous said...

Speaking of Beam Me Up Scotty... how about Warp(ed) Factor Nine?

Ok.. so it's reaching some.

Kari Hultman said...

Or how 'bout:
"For God's sake, Jim, I'm a doctor, not a woodworker!"

Anonymous said...

Shouldn't that be:
"For God's sakes Jim, I'm a woodworker, not a Doctor!"

rookster said...

"Everything's a hammer except a chisel, and that's a screwdriver."

I've a set of chisels that came to me after obviously being used as screwdrivers, and it hurts to think about the condition they were in. But they were great no-guilt tools for regrinding with custom profiles.

Metalworker Mike said...

Some of the ones here so far are really from other trades (like blacksmithing), not wood at all, but here's one I like:

'"I see," said the blind carpenter, who picked up his hammer and saw.'

M.Mike

Vic Hubbard said...

"He couldn't see the forest, for the trees." See Kari, this post was like a week ago and I'm still obsessing. Nice, thank a lot.:D

Keith July said...

As tight as bark on a tree