ditchwater
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(as) dull as ditchwater
Very boring or unexciting. This phrase is often used to describe a person. My date with Dave was not great—he is as dull as ditchwater. I fell asleep during that movie because it was as dull as ditchwater. That lady is nice enough, but she's just dull as ditchwater. Like, I didn't need a 10 minute recap about how she almost lost her keys this morning.
See also: ditchwater, dull
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms. © 2024 Farlex, Inc, all rights reserved.
*dull as dishwater
and *dull as ditch water very uninteresting. (*Also: as ~.) I'm not surprised that he can't find a partner. He's as dull as dishwater. Mr. Black's speech was as dull as dishwater.
McGraw-Hill Dictionary of American Idioms and Phrasal Verbs. © 2002 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.
dull as dishwater
Boring, tedious, as in That lecture was dull as dishwater. The original simile, dull as ditchwater, dating from the 1700s, alluded to the muddy water in roadside ditches. In the first half of the 1900s, perhaps through mispronunciation, it became dishwater, that is, the dingy, grayish water in which dirty dishes had soaked.
The American Heritage® Dictionary of Idioms by Christine Ammer. Copyright © 2003, 1997 by The Christine Ammer 1992 Trust. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.
dull as ditchwater
ordull as dishwater
If someone or something is as dull as ditchwater or as dull as dishwater, they are very boring. He's a dull writer and that's a fact. Dull as ditchwater. `Most of the politicians in Ontario are dull as dishwater,' he said. Note: The expression `dull as ditchwater' is over 200 years old, whereas `dull as dishwater' is a more recent variant. The reference is to the dull dirty colour of the water in ditches or in washing-up bowls.
See also: ditchwater, dull
Collins COBUILD Idioms Dictionary, 3rd ed. © HarperCollins Publishers 2012
dull as dishwater (or ditchwater)
extremely dull.Farlex Partner Idioms Dictionary © Farlex 2017
(as) dull as ˈditchwater
(British English) (American English (as) dull as ˈdishwater) very boring: Best-seller or not, the book sounds as dull as ditchwater to me.See also: ditchwater, dull
Farlex Partner Idioms Dictionary © Farlex 2017
dull as dishwater
verbMcGraw-Hill's Dictionary of American Slang and Colloquial Expressions Copyright © 2006 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
dull as dishwater
Flat, boring. This expression began life in the eighteenth century as dull as ditchwater, alluding to the muddy color of the water in roadside gullies. “He’d be sharper than a serpent’s tooth, if he wasn’t as dull as ditchwater,” says Dickens’s Fanny Cleaver (Oliver Twist). This version survived on both sides of the Atlantic well into the twentieth century. Either through careless pronunciation or through similar analogy it occasionally became dishwater—water in which dishes had been washed and which consequently was dingy and grayish.
The Dictionary of Clichés by Christine Ammer Copyright © 2013 by Christine Ammer