Grammar: Mixed Metaphors and Garbled Clichés 15

Suffocated by her clock

Is there a danger of the Conservative party getting on the wrong side of history in this argument? One must handle with kid gloves the suggestion that we should go with the flow. (Times Nov 2015)

a visceral panorama (courtesy of Sam Leith)

War clouds were brewing over Europe. (Secrets of the Manor House) (War clouds were gathering, war was brewing.)

In the pressure cooker of Europe, things are on a knife edge. (Katie Hopkins Jan 2016)

London at risk from “devastating housing bubble” X is a police officer whose marriage is in uncertain waters. (strandmag.com Try “on shaky ground”.)

[Religion is a] receding pocket of ignorance. (Neil de Grasse Tyson)

high-cheeked WASP beauties (Daily Beast) (It’s high cheekbones that we aspire to.)

There's no putting Pandora back in the box! (Pandora opened a tempting box she’d been told not to touch, and released all the evils onto the world. All that remained in the box was hope.)

A lot of delusions afflicting this place will have to be confronted over the next few years. Motes will fall from eyes. (Brian Baker ‏@SciFiBaker It’s scales that fall from eyes. The “mote” proverb is about a man who tries to remove a speck of dust from someone else’s eye (the mote) but fails to see the plank in his own (the beam).)

The Blairites have used our community as a political football to smear Jeremy Corbyn.

The Unions have always been the rock, the anchor that kept the Labour Party stable on stormy seas. (Speaker on Andrew Marr. You don’t want to find a rock in stormy seas, and you wouldn’t drop anchor either.)

Beatrix Potter was in no way a wilting violet! (Countryfile That’s “shrinking violet” – tiny, hard-to-see violets were supposed to be hiding shyly under their leaves.)

A modern woman who is suddenly suffocated and strangled by her ticking clock (Young Vic Theatre ‏@youngvictheatre. I think they mean “biological clock” – ie the fact that a woman only has a short period of time in which she can have children.)

Another red herring to dangle over people’s heads. (Ah Sweet Mystery blog You drag a red herring – on a string – across a path or trail to confuse the hounds. It’s the sword of Damocles that dangles over people’s heads.)

It's not going to be plain sailing. There will be some bumps in the road. (Tory Party conference)

More here, and links to the rest.