[New post] ‘as busy as a one-armed taxi-driver with crabs’ and other colourful phrases

Pascal Tréguer posted: "First recorded in 1906, the colloquial American-English phrase as busy as a one-armed paperhanger, and variants, mean exceedingly busy. An earlier British-English phrase, as busy as the devil in a high wind, was recorded by the English antiquary and lexi" New post on word histories 'as busy as a one-armed taxi-driver with crabs' and other colourful phrases by Pascal Tréguer There have been, since the early 20th century a number of colourful variants of the U.S. phrase 'as busy as a one-armed paperhanger'—for example, in Australian English, 'as busy as a one-armed taxi-driver with crabs' and 'as busy as a brickie in Beirut'. Read more of this post Pascal Tréguer | November 3, 2021 at 6:29 am | Tags: animals, Australia, dictionaries, human body, military, newspapers & magazines, phrases, radio, United Kingdom, USA | Categories: Australia & New Zealand, etymology, United Kingdom & Ireland, USA & Canada | URL: https://wp.me/p7ERDO-aJV Like Unsubscribe to no longer receive posts from word histories. Change your email settings at Manage Subscriptions. Trouble clicking? Copy and paste this URL into your browser: http://wordhistories.net/2021/11/03/one-armed-taxi-driver/ Thanks for flying with WordPress.com