all balls and bang me arse! Sheer nonsense. An intensifier of the basic all balls! British use, probably since the 1910s.
(I’m) all behind like the cow’s tail What people say when they are behind with their tasks. The expression ‘all behind like a cow’s tail’ has also been used to describe a person who is always last or is of a daydreaming disposition. ‘C. H. Rolph’ wrote in London Particulars (1980): ‘Grandma Hewitt [his grandmother] was a walking repository, rather than a dictionary, of clichés and catchphrases; and I have often wished she could have been known to Mr Eric Partridge during the compilation of his delectable dictionaries. Both she and I…could pre-date many of [his] attributions. Here are four examples…all of which were common currency in my Edwardian childhood: “Just what the doctor ordered”, “Are you kidding?”, “Cheats never prosper”, and “All behind like a cow’s tail”.’ There is also, of course, the expression ‘All behind like Barney’s bull’.
all bitter and twisted Said about someone who is psychologically mixed-up and shows it. Sometimes made light of in the form ‘all twitter and bisted’. Since the 1940s, at least.
all contributions gratefully received As with please give generously/all you can, this is a standard phrase from charitable appeals for money. But it is also used jokingly when accepting gifts of almost anything – another helping of food, even a sexual favour. Probably since the first half of the 20th century.
—, all day! A response to the question ‘What day is it?’ or ‘What’s the date?’ For example, ‘Tuesday/the 13th…all day!’ In use since the late 19th century.
(it’s) all done and dusted Meaning, ‘that task has been completed’. Heard in a Yorkshire hotel in 1996, but much older.
(it’s) all done with mirrors Used as a way of describing how anything has been accomplished when the method is not obvious. Originally, a way of explaining how conjuring tricks and stage illusions were performed when some, indeed, were done using mirrors – but without going into detail. Admiration, but also a suspicion of trickery, is implicit in the phrase. Noël Coward uses it in Private Lives (1930); They Do It With Mirrors is the title of an Agatha Christie thriller (1952). Compare SMOKE AND MIRRORS.
all dressed up and nowhere to go A phrase used to describe forlorn indecision comes (slightly altered) from a song popularized by the American comedian Raymond Hitchcock in The Beauty Shop (New York 1914) and Mr Manhattan (London 1915): ‘When you’re all dressed up and no place to go, / Life seems dreary, weary and slow.’ The words gained further emphasis when they were used by William Allen White to describe the Progressive Party following Theodore Roosevelt’s decision to retire from presidential competition in 1916. He said it was: ‘All dressed up with nowhere to go.’ The OED2 has the phrase starting life in a song by ‘G. Whiting’ (1912), ‘When You’re All Dressed Up and Have No Place to Go’. But Lowe’s Directory of Popular Music ascribes the song to Silvio Hein and Benjamin Burt.
all dressed up like a Christmas tree Gaudily attired – not a compliment. Since the late 19th century.
all dressed up like a pox-doctor’s clerk Flashily attired – not a compliment. Since the late 19th century. Presumably the implication is that a pox-doctor’s clerk would have plenty of money and that he would not spend it on tasteful clothing.
allegedly A single word slipped into libellous or slanderous statements to defuse them on the BBC TV topical quiz, Have I Got News For You (1990– ). Principally employed by the original host, Angus Deayton. The approach had much earlier been used by David Frost on BBC TV, That Was The Week That Was (1962–4).
alley See I WOULDN’T LIKE TO MEET.
all for one and one for all [tous pour un, un pour tous] The motto of the Three Musketeers in the novel Les Trois Mousquetaires (1844–5) by Alexandre Dumas. It had appeared earlier in Shakespeare’s Lucrece, lines 141–4 (1594), as: ‘The aim of all is but to nurse the life / With honour, wealth and ease, in waning age; / And in this aim there is much thwarting strife / That one for all, or all for one we gage [= pledge].’ Dumas apparently derived the motto from a form of words he recorded in an account of a journey to Switzerland (1833). In the Berne Parliament, the pledge given by representatives of the regions who formed the basis of the Swiss federation in AD 1291 is rendered as ‘Einer für alle, alle für einen.’ Compare ‘Each for all and all for each’ – Co-Operative Wholesale Society (UK, 20th century).
all fur coat and no knickers Given to show and having no modesty; poverty concealed in an effort to keep up appearances; elegant on the outside but sleazy underneath, when describing a certain type of woman. Encountered in a Welsh context (1988), it was also the title of play that toured the UK in the same year. A variant (1993), said to come from Lancashire (or, at least, from the North of England), is: ‘Red hat, no knickers’. A similar expression is all kid gloves and no drawers This last was given as an example of colourful Cockney bubble-pricking by the actor Kenneth Williams in Just Williams (1985). He said it was used in his youth (1930s) to denote the meretricious. ‘Silk stockings and no knickers’ is another version.
all gas and gaiters To do with the church, especially the higher clergy. All Gas and Gaiters was the title of a BBC TV comedy series about the clergy (1966–70). The title was taken from Charles Dickens, Nicholas Nickleby, Chap. 49 (1838–9): ‘All is gas and gaiters.’ Gaiters (leg coverings below the knee) have been traditionally associated with bishops. ‘Gas’ presumably hints at their accustomed volubility.
all gong and no dinner All talk and no action. What you would say of a loud-mouthed person, somewhat short on achievement. Current by the mid-20th century. Partridge/Slang has a citation from BBC Radio’s The Archers in 1981. Michael Grosvenor Myer, Cambridgeshire (1999), produced a Texan variant: ‘All hat and no cattle.’
all good things must come to an end A proverbial expression meaning ‘pleasure cannot go on for ever’. Spoken at the completion of absolutely any activity that is enjoyable (but usually said with a touch of piety). CODP points out that the addition of the word ‘good’ to this proverb is a recent development. ‘To all things must be an end’ can be traced back to the 15th century. There is a version from 1440, and, as ‘Everything has an end’, the idea appears in Chaucer’s Troilus and Criseyde (1385). The Book of Common Prayer version of Psalm 119:96 is: ‘I see that all things come to an end.’
all hands above the bedclothes, girls See HANDS OFF COCKS.
all hands on deck! Everybody help. Obviously of naval origin – but now used in any emergency, serious or slight, domestic or otherwise. Since the 19th century?
all hell broke loose Pandemonium broke out. This descriptive phrase probably derives its popularity from its use in Milton’s Paradise Lost, Bk 4, line 917 (1667), when the Archangel Gabriel speaks to Satan: ‘Wherefore with thee / Came not all hell broke loose.’ But Milton had been anticipated in this by the author of a Puritan pamphlet, Hell Broke Loose: or, a Catalogue of Many of the Spreading Errors, Heresies and Blasphemies