Déménager à la cloche de bois
Meaning: To do a moonlight flit, leaving without paying the rent.
Language: French
Literally: To move out by the wooden bell
Category: Daily Life
Origin: A wooden bell makes no sound, so moving to its ringing is moving in complete silence. The phrase is nearly always about escaping a landlord.
More idioms — Daily Life
- Rater le coche — To miss an opportunity through being too slow.
- Être coiffé au poteau — To be beaten by a hair right at the finish.
- Aux quatre coins de — All over; in every part of a place.
- Frappé au coin du bon sens — Manifestly sensible; bearing the stamp of sound judgment.
- Collet monté — Prim, stiff and old-fashioned in manner.
- Dans le collimateur — In someone's sights; singled out for scrutiny.
More French idioms
- Donner de la confiture à un cochon — To waste something fine on someone incapable of appreciating it.
- Un corbeau — The anonymous author of poison-pen letters.
- Bayer aux corneilles — To stand around idly, staring into space.
- Un panier de crabes — A group whose members constantly undermine one another.
- Chat échaudé craint l'eau froide — One bad experience makes you wary even where there is no danger.
- Une faim de loup — Ravenous hunger.
From our tongue twisters
- Un beau ver vert dans un verre vert verra un ver vert. — Ver (worm), vert (green), and verre (glass) are near-homophones — distinguishing them at…
- Didon dîna, dit-on, du dos d'un dodu dindon dont le dodu dos dodine. — A 'd' / 'din' / 'dod' avalanche that seems designed to jam the tongue in third gear.
- Un chasseur sachant chasser doit savoir chasser sans son chien. — The classic French 'ch' / 's' tangler.
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