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Aussie expressions

Aussie expressions

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How many of these can you recognise / translate?
a few roos loose in the top paddock
flat out like a lizard drinking
the most fun you can have with your pants on
got you by the short and curlies
couldn't organise a piss-up in a brewery
an ankle

Some of them may have been stolen from somewhere else, I'm not claiming originality here. 🙂

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Originally posted by Kewpie
How many of these can you recognise / translate?
a few roos loose in the top paddock
flat out like a lizard drinking
the most fun you can have with your pants on
got you by the short and curlies
couldn't organise a piss-up in a brewery
an ankle

Some of them may have been stolen from somewhere else, I'm not claiming originality here. 🙂
All of them, except 'an ankle', unless it means ankle biter, which refers to young children.

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Originally posted by Kewpie
How many of these can you recognise / translate?
a few roos loose in the top paddock
flat out like a lizard drinking
the most fun you can have with your pants on
got you by the short and curlies
couldn't organise a piss-up in a brewery
an ankle

Some of them may have been stolen from somewhere else, I'm not claiming originality here. 🙂
i shall give a few equivalents


1. you are not the full Bob (Dylan being assumed and intended to rhyme with shilling, an old money measurement before decimalisation) meaning you are crazy

2. doing the back crawl home (dead drunk)

3. you couldn't cause anarchy in a nursery (ineffectual organisation)

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Originally posted by Kewpie
How many of these can you recognise / translate?
a few roos loose in the top paddock
flat out like a lizard drinking
the most fun you can have with your pants on
got you by the short and curlies
couldn't organise a piss-up in a brewery
an ankle

Some of them may have been stolen from somewhere else, I'm not claiming originality here. 🙂
"Arvo" comes to mind..

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Haven't heard "arvo" in years, maybe I'm mixing in the wrong circles. We do have a habit of shortening every other long word that way.

Ankle is a nasty insult, the implication being "two feet lower than an a-hole". Can even be used in mixed company because the wowsers don't recognise it as profanity.

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This one has been gaining popularity in recent years

'I'd like to congratulate the England team'

🙂

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Bob's your uncle and Fanny's your aunt.

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Nobody picked me up on wowsers, so I assume it's worldwide.

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Originally posted by Kewpie
Nobody picked me up on wowsers, so I assume it's worldwide.
Large headlights, if you get my drift! 😉

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No, it's apparently Australian after all. From our national university:

"The term wowser - surely one of the most impressive and expressive of Australian coinages - is used to express healthy contempt for those who attempt to force their own morality on everyone. The person who abstains from alcohol (for whatever reason) is not thereby a wowser: s/he's just probably very fit. But when s/he tries to force everyone else to do as s/he does, then s/he is a wowser. Or as C.J. Dennis defines the term: 'Wowser: an ineffably pious person who mistakes this world for a penitentiary and himself for a warder'."

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I have an Aussie friend who refers to the outback as the 'yip yip', and another who refutes this and calls it the 'wup wup' (wup as in woof). Can anybody clarify? (Or are they just both insane, and therefore should I chose my friends more carefully?)

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Originally posted by Indonesia Phil
I have an Aussie friend who refers to the outback as the 'yip yip', and another who refutes this and calls it the 'wup wup' (wup as in woof). Can anybody clarify? (Or are they just both insane, and therefore should I chose my friends more carefully?)
Australians use "Woop Woop" to refer to a place far out in the wilderness as anyone can get. That's the usual way to spell it. Your guy is showing another Aussie habit, mangling a well-known expression. Aussies like to be nonconformist, mostly we spell real words correctly but occasionally we make our own just to show our individuality.

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I guess Originally posted by Kewpie
How many of these can you recognise / translate?
a few roos loose in the top paddock
flat out like a lizard drinking
the most fun you can have with your pants on
got you by the short and curlies
couldn't organise a piss-up in a brewery
an ankle

Some of them may have been stolen from somewhere else, I'm not claiming originality here. 🙂
I guess roo is a kangaroo. Love Australia!

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