Language Café

Definition: To sacrifice a friend or ally for selfish reasons.Origin: " In the rock 'n' roll business, you are either on the bus or under it" is supposed to be a quote by Cyndi Lauper. However, those lines were written by journalist David Remnick in an article about Lauper, but they are not attributed in the article to her or anyone else.

Definition: To make the wrong choice; to ask the wrong person; to follow the wrong course.Origin: The phrase is an allusion to the mistake made by dogs when they believe they have chased a prey up a tree, but the prey may have escaped by leaping from one tree to another.

Definition: Appear promising but ultimately disappoint.Origin: Origin unclear, but often found in sports commentary.

Definition: Perform an act in a perfunctory, uncommitted fashion, as if it didn't matter.Origin: General usage dates back to 2006. Prevalent in the music industry where artists/musicians would be in different rooms but appear on the same song, indicating a lack of commitment on both sides.

Definition: A person who is lazy and does not live up to their responsibilities.Origin: American English slang, perhaps originally Civil War slang, from dead (adj.) + beat. Earlier used colloquially as an expression to mean "completely beaten" (1821), and perhaps the base notion is of worn out or good for nothing.

Definition: To deal with something slowly because you do not really want to do it.Origin: From walking while dragging one's feet along the ground, either from lack of enthusiasm or to intentionally slow down movement.

Definition: Something that causes (someone) to feel extremely upset or disappointed.Origin: Gutting something means to remove its intestines. So the emotional feeling of being disappointed, is similar.

Definition: To have a fixation on or be addicted to something.Origin: Said to come from Jones Alley, in Manhattan, associated with drug addicts.

Definition: An aspirational term for what you'd like your group of friends to be or accomplish.Origin: The term derives from the term squadron, which is historically an army cavalry unit. In March 24, 2004, Urban Dictionary user Greenie submitted a definition for squad defining it as "an informal group of individuals with a common identity and a sense of solidarity."Adding "goals" to it is a recent internet phenomenon.

Definition: 1. Also used to express contemptuous disagreement or disbelief about what has been said.2. Stop putting pressure on someone about something.Origin: A "break" was an interruption in a street performer's act used to collect money from the crowd. The term was taken up by the underworld where it came to mean the money collected for a felon on release from prison - he was given a break. A theory that the popular usage of the phrase meaning disbelief, was popularized in the film E.T.