Themistocles

 I cannot fiddle, but I can make a great state from a little city” - Themistocles. 

Mare's nest

Something imagined to be an extraordinary discovery but proving to be a delusion or a hoax: The announced cure for the disease was merely another mare's-nest. 2. an extremely confused, entangled, or disordered place, situation, etc.: We just moved in, and the place is a mare's-nest.

mare's nest  NOUN  1A complex or confused situation; a muddle: your desk’s usually a mare’s nest  illusory discovery: the mare’s nest of perfect safety  Origin  late 16th century: formerly in the phrase to have found a mare's nest, meaning 'to have discovered something amazing' (i.e. something that does not exist). 

Tease out

Tease out verb  1. (transitive, adverb) to extract (information) with difficulty tease out Lure out, obtain or extract with effort, as in We had a hard time teasing the wedding date out of him. This term alludes to the literal sense of tease, “untangle or release something with a pointed tool.” [Mid-1900s ] 

Dimbulb

Dimbulb [dim-buhlb, -buhlb]  Spell  Syllables Word Origin noun, Slang. 1. a stupid person; dimwit. 

qui tacet consentire

qui tacet consentire 

Cut no ice with somebody

Cut no ice with somebody if something cuts no ice with someone, it does not cause them to change their opinion or decision. I've heard her excuses and they cut no ice with me. 

Shnorrer

Shnor·rer  [shnawr-er, shnohr-] noun schnorrer (Yiddish) a scrounger who takes advantage of the generosity of others [syn: schnorrer] 

Dog in that fight

Dog in that fight "I don't have a dog in that fight," means "I don't have a stake in the outcome."

Ge·ni·us lo·ci

Ge·ni·us lo·ci  [gen-i-oos loh-kee; English jee-nee-uhs loh-sahy, -kahy] Latin. 1. guardian of a place. 2. the distinctive character or atmosphere of a place with reference to the impression that it makes on the mind. n 1. the guardian spirit of a place 2. the special atmosphere of a particular place   [genius of the place] 

Magellan

Magellan  Ma·gel·lan  [muh-jel-uhn]  noun 1. Ferdinand, c1480–1521, Portuguese navigator: discoverer of the Straits of Magellan 1520 and the Philippines 1521. 2. a strait near the S tip of South America between the mainland of Chile and Tierra del Fuego and other islands, connecting the Atlantic and the Pacific. 360 miles (580 km) long; 2½–17 miles (4–27 km) wide.

Penury

Penury  pen·u·ry  [pen-yuh-ree] extreme poverty; destitution. 2. scarcity; dearth; inadequacy; insufficiency. Origin:  1400–50; late Middle English  < Latin pēnūria;  akin to Greek peîna  hunger, penía  poverty  Synonyms  1. indigence, need, want.  Antonyms  1. wealth. penury  (ˈpɛnjʊrɪ)    — n 1. extreme poverty 2. extreme scarcity   [C15: from Latin pēnūria  dearth, of obscure origin]

vastitude

vastitude    \ VAS-ti-tood, -tyood, VAH-sti- \  , noun;     1. vastness; immensity: the vastitude of his love for all humankind . 2. a vast expanse or space: the ocean vastitude : He glances around him in a circular direction to indicate the vastitude  of the question, a vastitude  which is to be inferred from the established fact of the ambient desert. -- Raymond Queneau, translated by Barbara Wright, The Blue Flowers , 1965

APRIL 10, 2013, 12:42 PM 1 Comments Architectural Masterpiece in Moscow Under Grave Threat, Preservationists Say By SOPHIA KISHKOVSKY MOSCOW —

 The Russian avant-garde architect Konstantin Melnikov’s seminal cylindrical house in Moscow, which has inspired architects around the world for nearly a century, is gravely threatened by construction of a large multipurpose complex abutting its tiny backyard, Russian and international preservationists say.  The work has led to “numerous new cracks” to the building’s load-bearing and partition walls and signs of damage to its foundation, according to an appeal that Russian architecture and heritage experts addressed to President Vladimir V. Putin and other officials.  The house is on a side street just off of the central Arbat pedestrian mall, which is known as a busy tourist trap. Real estate continues to be at prime value in Russia even as the country’s oil boom has waned. The construction project is the latest to take place in the vicinity of what is regarded as one of Modernist architecture’s most famous works, completed in 1929 and used by Melnikov as a home and studio when the very act of building a private house in Soviet Russia was revolutionary.  The letter to Mr. Putin was posted this month on the Web site of Archnadzor, a Moscow-based preservation watchdog group that is battling developers across the Russian capital. It was accompanied by photographs of the damage, and warned that the “risk of losing a masterpiece of 20th-century world architecture” had “grown significantly” and was magnified by a failure to take measures to prevent the house’s collapse.  “The eyes of the world are on Russia in this important case,” Ana Tostoes, the chairwoman of Docomomo International, a grassroots architectural heritage organization, said in a joint statement released with the International Council on Monuments and Sites. The organizations have also appealed to Mr. Putin to intervene.  Natalia Melikova, a recent Master of Fine Arts graduate from the Academy of Art University in San Francisco, posted a detailed report on the Web site of the United States branch of Docomomo. In it, Konstantin Melnikov’s granddaughter, Ekaterina Karinskaya, who lives in the house, says that the construction is part of a willful plan “to simply destroy the house.”  Ms. Melikova has returned to Moscow, where she has started the Constructivist Project to try to save the Melnikov house and other endangered sites.  A prolonged dispute over ownership of the house, still not resolved, has kept it from being given official landmark status, and the latest in a series of stalled efforts to turn it into a museum is in the earliest stages.  Architectural heritage is in danger around Moscow. The great-grandson of the Russian engineering design pioneer Vladimir Shukhov warned last month that his great-grandfather’s early Soviet-era radio tower, which architects including Norman Foster have named as one of their greatest sources of inspiration, could soon collapse from neglect.  Tsarist-era buildings are also under constant threat. Archnadzor is fighting to save a mansion that served as the setting for scenes in “War and Peace” and “Anna Karenina.” An organization with Kremlin connections has been reconstructing the building. And just outside of Moscow, preservationists are fighting development around Arkhangelskoye, a palatial estate that was once home to Feliks Yusupov, a prince who took part in the killing of Rasputin. They say that construction projects promoted by Russia’s defense ministry and the billionaire Viktor Vekselberg would destroy the estate’s grounds.

Horses for courses

Horses for courses.  (British & Australian) something that you say which means that it is important to choose suitable people for particular activities because everyone has different skills Ah well, horses for courses. Just because a plumber can mend your washing machine, it doesn't follow that he can mend your car as well. See Don't spare the horses, Hold horses!

La·od·i·ce·an

La·od·i·ce·an  (l-d-sn) adj. 1. Of or relating to Laodicea. 2. Indifferent or lukewarm especially in matters of religion. n. A native or inhabitant of Laodicea. [Adj., sense 2, in reference to Revelation 3:14-16.]

blow someone or something out of the water

blow someone or something out of the water

Fig. to destroy utterly someone or something, such as a plan. (Alludes to a torpedo or other weapon striking a ship and causing a great explosion that makes pieces of the ship fly out of the water.) I will blow him out of the water if he shows up around here. The boss blew the whole idea out of the water.

See also: blow, out, water

McGraw-Hill Dictionary of American Idioms and Phrasal Verbs. © 2002 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.

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blow something/somebody out of the water

to destroy or defeat something or someone completely They came to court with fresh evidence that would, they said, blow the prosecution's case completely out of the water.

See also: blow, out, water

Cambridge Idioms Dictionary, 2nd ed. Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2006. Reproduced with permission.

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blow something out of the water

to destroy something The virus blew my computer's hard drive completely out of the water. My lawyer blew their case right out of the water with his witnesses.

See also: blow, out, water

blow you out of the water

1. to completely surprise you Her singing blew me out of the water - I haven't heard anyone sing like that since Sarah Vaughn.

2. to defeat or completely confuse you We were blown out of the water by that team - they didn't make one mistake the whole game! Those directions blew us out of the water. We couldn't follow them at all.

Second-guess somebody/something

second-guess somebody/something   1. to try to guess what will happen or what someone will do It's not for us to second-guess the court's decision - we'll just have to wait and see. 2. to criticize someone's actions or an event after it has happened It's easy to second-guess the team's coach - but let's face it, he made big mistakes

Bumptious

bumptious     Use Bumptious in a sentence bump·tious  [buhmp-shuhs]   adjective offensively self-assertive: a bumptious young upstart. Origin:  1795–1805; bump + (frac)tious  Related forms bump·tious·ly, adverb bump·tious·ness, noun o·ver·bump·tious, adjective o·ver·bump·tious·ly, adverb o·ver·bump·tious·ness, noun

Grasp the nettle

Grasp the nettle UK: to force yourself to be brave and do something that is difficult or unpleasant: You've been putting off making that phone call for days - I think it's about time you grasped the nettle!