Two figures of speech that I hate

[xiphias]

There are, of course, competing homilies -- you should look before you strike while the iron is hot, because he who hesitates measures twice and cuts once. But I'm talking about sayings that are just plain WRONG on their face.

For the record -- given a choice, I DON'T measure, and rather line the piece up with where I want it to go, draw a mark, then cut along the mark. I don't ACTUALLY know if the board is 4' 9 1/2" or 4' 10" or whatever -- all I know is that it's the same length as the place that it's supposed to fit. So I actually "measure never and cut until it fits", but "measure twice and cut once" isn't WRONG -- it's just useful in different circumstances. (If I was cutting the piece elsewhere, for instance, and bringing it over, that's how I'd do it, for instance.)

1. "Fight fire with fire."

No. Don't. Fight fire with WATER. Or maybe a CO2 extinguisher. A bucket of dirt and a shovel. Halon fire suppression systems. Stuff like that. But, c'mon. There ARE specific, limited conditions in which controlled back burns clear out fuel to prevent fires from spreading. But it really shouldn't be your go-to solution.

2. "You catch more flies with honey than with vinegar."

You ever tried? If you've got a fruit fly trap, you know what you bait it with? Vinegar. Not honey. Because flies don't LIKE honey. Every once in a while, a fly will land in honey and get stuck, but they don't seek it out. Vinegar, on the other hand is CRAZY addictive to fruit flies. They seek out, y'know, rotting fruit. Which turns into vinegar. Which is what they like. Not honey.

I'm sure I could come up with others. Any other favorites?

Comments

[greenlily.livejournal.com]

"The squeaky wheel gets the most grease".

I'm not a mechanical sort of person, so maybe this is actually true. I just really really hate it when people apply it to themselves and their Godzilla-given right to kvetch.

(Icon, and general sentiment, related to the most recent post in my own journal.)

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

Well, it IS true, so it's doesn't fall into this category. However, I suggest replying, "And then it gets replaced."

[metahacker.livejournal.com]

"These days, wheels use self-contained, self-lubricating thrust bearings..."

[rymrytr.livejournal.com]

The "Honey and Vinegar" was used to illustrate that it was better to talk or treat others nicely, if you wanted good results. If you were rude or condescending, you would not get the good treatment or responses you would expect, in the future, when dealing with someone to whom you have been "a pain in the butt"s.

"Squeaky - Grease" The Oregon Trail Wagons, for one example, was a long, daily drudge. You and a hundred other families going across miles and miles of miles and miles. A wooden wheel and a wooden axle, when not kept greased, created a loud and extremely annoying, high pitched scream...

"Fire with Fire" is a common concept in forestry and other land, weed and insect control. You start your fire on one place, where you have prepared the ground so that the fire can only go forward. Then, on the other side of the filed (or in fighting Forest Fires), you set a "back fire". The two fires come together, so that the highest point of heat and flame, is in the middle and thereby, more controllable. As and aside: Native populations often used controlled burning, to clear tall grass and then gather (and eat) the insects and other small animals.

"Measure twice" was a common thing, taught to apprentices. Once you cut the board to a length, and then tried to fit it in, sometimes you would find that you should have measured twice, to be assured. Once you became a Journeyman, in Cabinet Making for example, it was unnecessary to measure twice (or often), since you had, by then, learned the lessons of carelessness.

These are not all the examples related to these sayings; just those things I've learned, over the past 68 years.

And here's what I say, in place of (glass houses and rocks), which was used to say, "if you point at your neighbor and make accusations or gossip, you'd better be sure that there is no "sins" in your own life:

"Individuals who inhabit invisible edifices, should forgo the pleasures of hurling geological specimens indiscriminately!" :o)

[holyhippie]

On the 'you can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar' - not only is it false, I generally find it gets used by someone who has just felt like they have been mistreated. I've responded in one instance 'Honey left to ferment turns into vinegar' - meaning, that I tried to make a request in a timely and polite manner, but you ignored it and let the request sit. So I got mean.

[dave riba (from livejournal.com)]

Interesting. Had not really thought of the etymology of those sayings until you brought it up.
A quick superficial search brings up this origin theory

Shakespeare used the idea in 1595 in King John when he wrote, "Be stirring as the time; be fire with fire; / Threaten the threatener and outface the brow / Of bragging horror." However, Shakespeare did not actually use the phrase "fight fire with fire."

So, it is not FIGHT fire with fire, it is BE fire with fire -- eg if you are threatened, threaten back. Makes much more sense

You asked for other sayings?
A stitch in time saves nine.
Lis uses a stapler ...

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

Hmm. By that point in the play, King John is already well and truly screwed. The Bastard's advice is well-meant, but, y'know, by that point, whether John was fire with fire, or water, or whatever, he was already basically mud.

[elynne.livejournal.com]

I hate "you can't have your cake and eat it too." Partially because I find the basic sentiment annoying, but mostly because 1. eating cake is the whole point of having cake--what are you going to do with it if you don't eat it? enshrine it on an altar? 2. I can't imagine a more complete way of "having" anything than by eating and digesting it. After you've eaten that cake, it is yours, in every sense of the word--nobody can steal it from you, and (hopefully) nobody wants to.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

The saying makes a little more sense you do it the other way 'round: "You can't eat your cake and have it, too" -- once you've eaten the cake, you're no longer holding on to it. I mean, you can have the cake, and THEN eat it, but you can't EAT the cake and THEN have it.

That one doesn't bother me as much, though, because I've met two-and-a-half year olds. They DEFINITELY want to eat their cake, but still have it afterward: HAVING a cake is a pleasure; EATING a cake is a pleasure, and two-and-a-half year olds can't deal with the fact that one of those ends when the other one starts.

[elynne.livejournal.com]

hmm--the reversal does make it more clear, yes. and, well--two-year-old logic. can't argue with it. XD

[cos]

I think the "catch more flies with honey than vinegar" saying is actually getting its sense across correctly through being inaccurate, because what vinegar is to flies maps to what honey is to us while what honey is to flies maps to what vinegar is to us. IMO this makes it cleverly ironic, and a good example of the difference between truth and facts, or between information and data.

(Whether it's actually true and applicable in a given situation, is a different matter)

[jazzfish]

I've been unable to find it with a cursory search, but once on a time I stumbled over a list of reversed cliches:

"He who is last, hesitates."
"People who throw stones shouldn't live in glass houses."
"If you're not paying attention, you're not outraged."
Et cetera. Amusing how many of them still work.

[rymrytr.livejournal.com]

Look for "He who hesitates is lost".

[stakebait.livejournal.com]

I actually did try once to catch flies with honey and vinegar. Not fruit flies, just regular flies. I caught one with honey, and none with vinegar. So the saying was technically true in my case, but not really useful, since one did not make a dent in the large number of flies I was trying to get rid of.

I always assumed "fight fire with fire" was referring to controlled burns.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

And controlled burns ARE a thing that people do, and which are useful.

But they're not the go-to technique for most forms of fire. If my fire department showed up at my house when we had that kitchen fire years ago, and decided to do a controlled burn to keep it from coming up the stairs, it wouldn't have been the best choice.

And the way that the aphorism is used is "this is your first response. If someone is being violent and nasty, you should go ahead and be violent and nasty right back." So that's an aphorism which is both factually wrong, and metaphorically wrong.

[stakebait.livejournal.com]

Interesting! That's not the way I usually see that aphorism used. I usually see it used as "your first, and quite possibly second and third, responses have not worked. Now it's time to pull out the big guns."

Which, IMO, is much closer to the controlled burn scenario. If your kitchen fire had spread to the nearby grasslands...