until one is blue in the face
Meaning: For as long as one likes, with no result.
Language: English
Literally: (Already vivid in English)
Example: “You can complain until you're blue in the face; the rules won't change.”
Category: Body & Senses
Origin: Someone who talks or strains until the face changes color has spent all their breath for nothing. The phrase is recorded from the 19th century.
Equivalents in other languages
- Russian: до посинения (do posineniya) — literally: until blueness
More idioms — Body & Senses
- take matters into one's own hands — To act oneself because others have failed to.
- all in one's head — Imagined rather than real, or a matter of attitude.
- stink to high heaven — To smell terrible; also, to seem very dishonest.
- dig one's heels in — To refuse stubbornly to change one's mind.
- the scales fall from one's eyes — To suddenly see the truth after being deceived.
- feet of clay — A hidden weakness in someone or something admired.
More English idioms
- an accident waiting to happen — Someone or something very likely to cause trouble or harm.
- on a wing and a prayer — Only just managing, with luck rather than means.
- welcome to the club — Said to someone who has just joined you in a shared situation, usually an unwelcome one.
- tell me another one — Said to someone whose story is obviously untrue.
- go off the rails — To lose control of one's life or behavior.
- there's nothing for it — There is no other choice.
From our untranslatable words
- Komorebi — The dappled light that filters through leaves and scatters across the ground.
- Schadenfreude — The guilty little pleasure of taking satisfaction in someone else's misfortune.
- Wabi-sabi — Finding beauty in imperfection, impermanence, and the worn or incomplete.