Idioms and Popular Phrases
- "A cat-o'-nine-tails suggests perfect punishment and atonement." --Robert Ripley.
- The word "K-9" pronounces the same as canine and is used in many U.S. police departments to denote the police dog unit. Despite not sounding like the translation of the word canine in other languages, many police and military units around the world use the same designation.
- Someone dressed "to the nines" is dressed up as much as they can be.
- In urban culture, "nine" is a slang word for a 9mm pistol or homicide, the latter from the Illinois Criminal Code for homicide.
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Famous quotes containing the words popular and/or phrases:
“We live under continual threat of two equally fearful, but seemingly opposed, destinies: unremitting banality and inconceivable terror. It is fantasy, served out in large rations by the popular arts, which allows most people to cope with these twin specters.”
—Susan Sontag (b. 1933)
“And would you be a poet
Before you’ve been to school?
Ah, well! I hardly thought you
So absolute a fool.
First learn to be spasmodic—
A very simple rule.
For first you write a sentence,
And then you chop it small;
Then mix the bits, and sort them out
Just as they chance to fall:
The order of the phrases makes
No difference at all.”
—Lewis Carroll [Charles Lutwidge Dodgson] (1832–1898)