a poke in the eye with a sharp stick
- idiom
- Informal
:
peor que un dolor de muelas
- Losing your keys is inconvenient, but it's not as bad as a poke in the eye with a sharp stick.
Examples
-
She admitted that the job wasn't great, but it's better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick.
-
Getting stuck in traffic is like a poke in the eye with a sharp stick!
-
When asked about the bland dinner, he joked that it was still better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick.
-
I'd rather face a challenge than suffer a poke in the eye with a sharp stick.
-
Losing your job is difficult, but it's not as bad as a poke in the eye with a sharp stick.
-
He found the new policy annoying, but he noted that it's better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick.
-
Although the meal was disappointing, she said it was still better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick.
Antonyms
How Unpleasant
- Informal
- Informal
640
3.5
1
6.1
- Informal
418
3.0
62
3.6
Surface Forms
Morphology
a + poke + in + the + eye + with + a + sharp + stick
The literal parts ('poke', 'eye', 'sharp', 'stick') transparently evoke a painful, very unpleasant experience, so a B1 learner who knows the words will readily infer the core meaning of something being nasty or painful. However, the conventionalized evaluative usage (e.g. idioms like 'I wouldn't do that for a poke in the eye with a sharp stick' or the comparative nuance that even an undesirable situation is better than something worse) is pragmatic and conventional, so the full idiomatic force is not entirely predictable from the parts.
Etymology
A poke in the eye with a sharp stick gives a clear picture: a poke in the eye from a sharp stick, which would be very painful and awful. People use this phrase as a joke to say something is 'very unpleasant' or that it is still 'better than something far worse'.