to be apples
1
9.9
- idiom
- Australian
- If we stick to the plan, the project will be apples by the end of the week.
Examples
-
Everything will be fine; don't worry, it will all be apples.
-
She'll be apples, mate!
Fiction book (1994) -
After discussing the issues, I assured him that everything would be apples soon.
Synonyms
1
9.9
Words people use to tell someone everything will be fine
Everything is fine and working well
Antonyms
How Okay
Surface Forms
Morphology
be + apples
This is an Australian informal idiom where 'apples' does not retain its literal sense of the fruit, so the meaning 'to be fine/okay' cannot be derived from 'be' + 'apples'. The sense is dialectal and idiomatic rather than compositional or metaphorically transparent, so a B1 learner who only knows the constituent words would not predict the idiomatic meaning.
Etymology
Be apples may come from the simple image of apples as fresh, healthy and good to eat, so calling something 'apples' meant it was all right. So when Australians say someone will be apples, they mean that person will 'be fine' or okay.