See DECEMBER, MAY AND.
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in one ear and out the other
Inattentive; soon forgotten. This vivid image dates from Roman times. “The things he says flow right through the ears,” wrote Quintillian (Institutionis Oratoriae, c. A.D. 80). The sentiment was echoed by Chaucer and joined John Heywood’s 1546 proverb collection (“Went in the tone eare, and out at the tother”). Thomas Hood punned on it
in his “Ode to the Late Lord Mayor” (1825): “He comes in at one year, to go
out by the other!”
in no uncertain terms
Emphatically, very clearly. This double negative appears to have become very popular about the middle of the twentieth century. Lawrence Durrell used it in Balthazar (1958): “I told Abdul so in no uncertain terms.” A slightly slangier synonym is LOUD AND CLEAR.
in high dudgeon
Angrily, resentfully, IN A HUFF. The origin of dudgeon has been lost and today the word is never used except with high—never alone and not even with low. In use from about 1600 on, the term was a cliché by the time explorer David Livingstone wrote “He went off in high dudgeon” (The Zambezi and Its Tributaries, 1865). The phrase may be dying out.
in full swing
Vigorously active. Various etymologists to the contrary, this term comes from a sixteenth-century use of swing for the course of a career or period of time. The only modern vestige of this meaning is in the cliché, which has survived. Indeed, it was already a cliché when George Meredith wrote (Evan Harrington, 1861), “A barrister in full swing of practice.”
