So here are the qualities associated to these particular animals: Strong, proud, clever and sick. Which one do you think is the strong one – peacock, horse, dog or fox? What about proud – which one of these would be associated with being proud? Clever? Sick?
And when someone is very smart, very clever, we can say that this person is sly as a fox. Sly means smart and clever, but sometimes in a cunning way. If we say that Mary is smart and cunning, we could be saying that Mary is capable of using deception in her favor. And beware… Deception does not mean “decepção.” Deception, to put it simply, is the act of fooling someone; of making someone believe something that is not true. So Mary can use deception; she can deceive you in a smart way to get what she wants. Cunning and sly are not always negative qualities necessarily; sometimes no one gets hurt… And sometimes doing something in a cunning way means nothing more than being very bright and doing that thing in a very clever way. I guess sly in a more negative sense could mean malandro, and in a more positive sense could mean just esperto. So people can be sly as fox.
And what about when someone is proud as a peacock? That’s not a compliment. We’re saying that this person is too proud; they’re vain even. But this idiom is frequently used in a good-natured way by parents who are proud of their kids, for example. Someone tweeted “Only a child can beat you at checkers and make you feel as proud as a peacock.” Or you could say “My manager’s compliments left me proud as a peacock, I must admit.” Have you ever felt as proud as a peacock? What happened that made you feel that way?
Hi, Ana! I’ve been following your podcasts for awhile and it’s been helping me improve my English quite a lot! Thanks a million!
A question! Why sometimes the structure “as…as something” is used without the first “as”? And sometimes with both of them? Such as: “Only a child can beat you at checkers and make you feel as proud as a peacock” – “My manager’s compliments left me proud as a peacock, I must admit.”
Looking forward to hearing from you.
Thanks a lot!
Ana, could you please tell me what’s the meaning of “vain even” that you used in this text?
thanks a bunch!
Hi, Ana! Dogs have a nature temperature that would be fever for human being. 38/39 degrees is normal for them… I think the expression “sick as a dog” comes from this…Maybe… ;)
Could be, Jana! Thanks.
It seems that you missed another well known idiom related to animal – “as stubbirn as a mule” Right?
I mean “stuborn”
It seems that you missed another well known idiom related to animal – “as stubbirn as a mule” Right?
Stubborn as a mule is a good one, Sergio. I wanted to cover 3 of them and didn’t come across your example – thanks for contributing!
Hi Ana. Thanks for posting an excellent content once more.
Today I’m proud as a peacock. Let me show you why. Once when I decided I needed to study English I knew that anything of my near environment required any kinda effort about it. So I, always, was reluctant into try to develop my English skill even with off teacher. Internet is a great place to achieve knowledge though.
Back to the topic, this week a manager asked for a certain person to find out a partner for specific product in China. He said he’ll try but nothing guarantee. In other words, he doesn’t showed concern about it. I hugged the cause and started searching into the internet and after three days I was lucked and found the best one I could found.
Even though I know how important English represents nowadays for our lives, I always saw it as an useless when I compared to the amount of effort I did. So today I’m proud as a peacock. It turns out been so useful. I know I need to keep in touch to learn as much as need to become a better speaker. But paid every effort so far.
Thansk for being so helpful. I’m appreciating your 101 Portuguese-English saying.
Congrats, Diogo :) Yep – learning more and more English keeps paying off – that is my experience as well :)
Hey Ana,very cool expressions I loved them! A few weeks ago I felt as proud as a peacock because I got an A on my English exam,I got really happy!!!! :D
Congrats!!! Yay!
Hello Ann, good evening!
I tried twice, but I didn’ t get to put my example here.
Hi Fátima,
É que o anti-spam do site às vezes pega comentário seu erroneamente como “spam”. Eu verifiquei a razão, que é o fato de alguns spammers enviarem mensagens com a palavra “Fátima” no meio!!
Quando vc enviar um comentário e ele não aparecer, não precisa enviar de novo. Quando eu verificar a caixa de spam, libero o seu.
Hello Ann, good evening!
This is my example: “It has happened things in my life that sometimes make me feel sick as a dog, but my faith in God is so big that I get to stand and, afterward, I begin to feel as strong as a horse in body, mind and feeling.”
Thanks Ann! May God continue giving you strenght to pass us your podcasts.
Nice, Fátima- Lembrando que sick as a dog e strong as a horse estão mais relacionados ao estado físico!