Day 14.33333: Peace, Man (and Idioms)

Listening to: "I'm Alive" from Next to Normal

Feeling pretty good right now. Playing my feel-good song, for starters. Late class tomorrow, also a plus. 

Hey, if I'm going to let you know when things get sad, I'm also going to let you know when things get good again. 

BONUS: Fun French idioms I've learned!

1. "Je suis tombé(e) dans les pommes."
Literally means: I fell in/on some apples.
Idiom means: I lost consciousness; I was knocked unconscious.
Why? This one does not seem to have an obvious explanation.

2. "Il/Elle a la banane."
Literally means: He/she has the banana.
Idiom means: He/she is feeling happy/fortunate.
Why? For the visual learners:

3. "Il/Elle est rouge comme une tomate."

Literally means: He/she is red like a tomato.

Idiom means: He/she is embarrassed.

Why? I mean, this one's obvious, right? We have the equivalent phrase in English.

4. "Ne ramène/ramenez pas ta/votre fraise!"

Literally means: Don't reduce your strawberries!

Idiom means: Yeah, this sounds silly to an English speaker, but this is basically the equivalent of "Stop bitching about it!" or "Stop being so rude!"

Why? I read some explanations, and most of them were unsatisfactory for me. Apparently it's a crude phrase, though we learned it in a sanctioned learning environment, so...

5. "Il/Elle a reçu le ballon en plein poire."

Literally means: He/she got a ball in the pear face.

Idiom means: He/she got hit right in the face.

Why? It's really the "en plein poire" part that is the idiom. I guess like how we say, "Smack dab in the face!" So it's not really the whole phrase that's the idiom, which makes a lot more sense now that I've looked that up...

I mean, hey. American students like to complain that these idioms don't make sense, but without historical context (which even most Americans don't have) for the phrase, would these make sense?

Bury the hatchet

Head over heels

Silver lining

Peeping Tom

Knock on wood

If you're now scratching your head and thinking, "Yeah, why do we actually say that?" then John Green can help you out. (As always, at least with teen angst issues.)