Il ne faut pas pousser mémé dans les orties

exp. – literally – don’t push granny in the poison ivy – figuratively – don’t take advantage. This conjures up a much more interesting picture than giving an inch and taking a mile. I also like “c’est la camembert qui dit au roquefort tu pues,” it’s the camembert that tells the roquefort it stinks vs. our pot calling the kettle black. Some of the French expressions can be so colourful. At other times, they can be more restrained. Where in English something can cost an arm and a leg, here it only costs an arm.

“Qui va a la chasse perd sa place,” he who goes hunting loses his place, which is a variation of our you snooze, you lose. Here there is hope though because “mais qui va à la pêche va repêche,” or but he who goes fishing gets it back.

One expression where I think we’ve got it right is with the early bird catching the worm. The French say “l'avenir appartient à celui qui se lève tôt,” or the future comes to he who wakes early. Direct and literal, it lacks the visual of the little bird eating the worm. But not being an early riser myself, I’ve always said, who wants a worm! The future on the other hand…

“Mettre de beurre dans les épinards” or “mettre poire dans ma soupe” are two expressions referencing food, putting butter on one’s spinach or pepper in one’s soup, that really mean trying to make a living. Beating around the bush here is “tourner autour du pot” or turning around the pot. “Langue de bois,” literally tongue of wood, means giving pat answers. “Geule de bois” or wooden mouth is the expression for a hangover. And “cheque en bois” or wooden check is the equivalent of our rubber check or one that bounces. In this case, rubber does make more sense than wood.

“Mieux vaut prevenir que guerir,” better to prevent than to heal is like our ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure or better safe than sorry.

“Main fer dans un gant velour” is the equivalent of our steel fist in a velvet glove – pretty much literally translated unless you want to split hairs over iron and steel. And for that, the French “couper les cheveux en quatre” or cut them in four so also pretty much the same as us.

I usually try to circle back to where I started with my posts, but since I had no real theme for this one other than to share some of these expressions I’ve been collecting, I have nowhere to go. I certainly don’t want to be pushed into the ivy so I will just leave it here where sleeping dogs lie as mine is doing right now.