Le petit doigt sur la couture du pantalon
Meaning: Standing rigidly to attention; obeying without question.
Language: French
Literally: Little finger on the trouser seam
Category: Body & Senses
Origin: The position of attention in French military drill places the hands flat against the thighs with the little fingers aligned on the trouser seams. Used of civilians, it is always mocking.
More idioms — Body & Senses
- Ôter une épine du pied à quelqu'un — To relieve someone of a persistent difficulty.
- Un écorché vif — Someone painfully hypersensitive to everything around them.
- L'huile de coude — Hard physical effort; elbow grease.
- Couper l'herbe sous le pied de quelqu'un — To forestall someone by acting first.
- Ne pas mâcher ses mots — To speak with complete bluntness.
- Il faut tourner sept fois sa langue dans sa bouche avant de parler — Think carefully before you speak.
More French idioms
- Se croire sorti de la cuisse de Jupiter — To have an absurdly high opinion of one's own importance.
- Le tonneau des Danaïdes — A hopeless undertaking that consumes everything and is never finished.
- Au diable vauvert — Miles from anywhere; the back of beyond.
- Il n'y a pas le feu au lac — There's no rush.
- Par l'opération du Saint-Esprit — By some unexplained miracle — said sarcastically of something nobody will account for.
- Au creux de la vague — At a low point, with the expectation that things will rise again.
From our compliments & insults
- Tête de linotte — A scatterbrain who can't hold a thought.
- Courir sur le haricot — To get badly on someone's nerves.
- Tu as du chien — You have a certain irresistible magnetism — a je-ne-sais-quoi that draws people in.
Browse all compliments & insults →
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