A-Z Database
US informal for a service station attendant, inter-changeable with gas jockey, dates from the mid-20th century. See also Disc Jockey
Pumped is US informal for excited as in pumped full of enthusiasm and adrenalin; dates from the 1980s, and can be accompanied by a fist pump.
see Pleased as Punch
To punch above one’s weight is to perform beyond expectations, and this figurative usage dates from the mid-20th century. It derives, of course, from...
A state of befuddlement or disorientation first used in the context of boxing in the early 20th century to describe a boxer who has taken too many pun...
The origin of this phrase as the final, dramatic line of a joke or story is unknown but it is thought to be of American origin from the late 19th/earl...
An American expression that is usually used in the negative form. For example, a person might say of another, “When up against it, he couldn’t punch h...
see Put someone’s lights out
see Air punch
A pundit is an expert and derives from the Hindi word pandit for a learned teacher or philosopher. The word existed in English in this original sense...
Punt meaning to gamble or place a bet dates from the early 18th century from the French ponter pointe, which means to bet against the bank or banker b...
This expression for purity was probably motivated by Shakespeare if not exactly coined by him. In Hamlet (c.1600) Act III, Scene I, he writes, “Be tho...
see Pearler
see Purple patch
A purple patch has come to mean a period of extraordinary success or good fortune, often short-lived, and dates in this sense from the early 20th cent...