don’t call us, we’ll call you

We’ll  let  you  know  when  a  decision— probably  an  unfavorable  one—has  been  made.  This  formulaic  brush-off dates from the mid-1940s and probably comes from the theater, ending an audition for a part. It was soon broadened to many areas where a candidate is rejected (for a job, political office, athletic team, and so on). A newer ver- sion of the theatrical rejection is Thank you very much, said without a hint of the gratitude implied by the words. It, too, may become a cliché.

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don’t ask

You  don’t  want  to  hear  bad  news, a  long  story, or  something unpleasant  or  embarrassing. This  slangy  phrase,  used  since  the  1960s  and only in conversation, may be a response to a direct question, such as “How did you do on the exam?” or used to impart information, as in “Ask me how much  we  have  left  in  the  bank.”—“How  much?”—“Don’t  ask.”  It  differs from don’t ask me, said with the emphasis on me, which is a casual and some- what  impolite  reply  that  means  “I  don’t  know”  (as  in  “‘When  does  the restaurant open?’—‘Don’t ask me.’” A newer variation is don’t ask, don’t tell, which  in  the  early  1990s  began  to  designate  a  policy  on  homosexuality adopted by the U.S. military in 1994.  Under this policy, personnel are not asked about their sexual orientation, and homosexuals are allowed to serve provided  they  do  not  openly  reveal  their  orientation.   This  usage  quickly spread  to  other  contexts,  as  in  “Our  veterinarian  has  a  “‘don’t  ask,  don’t tell’” policy about what happens to pets who must be put away.”

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donkey’s years

A long time. The origin here is disputed. Some say it is a rhyming  term  for  donkey’s  ears,  which  are  quite  long, and  possibly  also  a punning  allusion  to  the  Cockney  pronunciation  of “years” as “ears”; others believe  it  alludes  to  donkeys  being  quite  long-lived. The  expression  dates only from the late nineteenth century. Edward Lucas used it in The Vermilion Box (1916): “Now for my first bath for what the men call ‘donkey’s years,’ meaning years and years.”

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done deal, a

An irreversible agreement, a final decision or compact. This relatively new synonym for the long-used FAIT ACCOMPLI  dates only from the late  1970s, but  according  to William  Safire, it  had  a  near  predecessor  in  a done  thing. The  latter  surfaced  about  1700, and  Dickens  used  it: “It  was  a done  thing  between  him  and  Scrooge’s  nephew” (A  Christmas  Carol,  1843). The current cliché is also often used in the negative (not a done deal), as in

“We can interview another architect; it’s not a done deal, you know.”

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dollars to doughnuts

Absolutely, certainly. This expression is most often preceded by the verb “to bet” and indeed comes from wagering. If someone is willing to bet dollars against doughnuts, he or she is absolutely sure of winning, the pastries being considered worthless compared to hard cash. The term began to be employed in the late 1800s. F. W. Bronson used it in Nice People Don’t Kill (1940), “You can bet a dollar to a doughnut.” Alliteration no doubt helped it to survive.

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dog’s life

See A  DOG’S  LIFE.

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dog’s chance, not a

See CHINAMAN’S  CHANCE.

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dog’s age

See A  DOG’S AGE.

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dog in the manger

A  person  who  takes  or  keeps  something  wanted  by another out of sheer meanness. The expression comes from one of Aesop’s fables about  a  snarling  dog  who  prevents  the  horses  from  eating  their  fodder  even though the dog himself does not want it. It was probably a cliché by the time Frederick Marryat wrote (Japhet, 1836), “What a dog in the manger you must be—you can’t marry them both.”

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chilled to the bone

Very  cold  indeed. This  hyperbole  for  feeling  cold replaces  the  older  idea  of  one’s  blood  freezing. Thus  Shakespeare  wrote  of Pericles, after he was shipwrecked, “A man throng’d up with chill; my veins are cold” (Pericles, 2.1). This thought persisted well into the nineteenth cen- tury, appearing in poems by Tennyson (“Till her blood was frozen slowly,” in “The  Lady  of  Shalott”)  and  Lawrence  Binyon  (“In  the  terrible  hour  of  the dawn, when the veins are cold,” in Edith Cavell).

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child’s play, easy as/that’s

Extremely simple, easily accomplished. The earliest use of this simile appears in Chaucer’s The Merchant’s Tale: “I warne yow wel, it is no childes pley to take a wyf with-outen avysement.” It was probably a cliché by the time Thomas Carlyle wrote, “The craftsman finds it no child’s-play” (Chartism, 1839).

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chief cook and bottle washer

Individual who has most of the many and quite varied responsibilities in an enterprise. This slangy Americanism origi- nated  in  the  first  half  of  the  1800s. Alluding  to  kitchen  duties, the  term  is used far more broadly, as in “Mr. Miller described himself as the ‘president, chief  cook  and  bottle  washer’  of  his  company”  (New York  Times,  Nov.  7,

1992).

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chickens come home to roost, one’s

One’s  sins  or  mistakes  always catch up with one. The idea of retribution is, of course, very old, recorded in ancient Greek and Roman writings. Virgil’s Aeneid, for example, has it, “Now do thy sinful deeds come home to thee.” This particular turn of phrase, how- ever, appears to have been invented by the English poet Robert Southey, who wrote  it  as  a  motto  in  The  Curse  of  Kehama  (1809): “Curses  are  like  young chickens; they always come home to roost.”

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