Block that Metaphor!
Actual Analogies and Metaphors Found in High School Essays
* Her face was a perfect oval, like a circle that had its two other sides gently compressed by a Thigh Master.
* It hurt the way your tongue hurts after you accidentally staple it to the wall.
* His thoughts tumbled in his head, making and breaking alliances like underpants in a dryer without Cling Free.
* He spoke with the wisdom that can only come from experience, like a Guy who went blind because he looked at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it and now goes around the country speaking at high schools about the dangers of looking at a solar eclipse without one those boxes with a pinhole in it.
* She grew on him like she was a colony of E. coli and he was room-temperature Canadian beef.
* She had a deep, throaty, genuine laugh, like that sound a dog makes just before it throws up.
* Her vocabulary was as bad as, like, whatever.
* He was as tall as a six-foot-three-inch tree.
* The revelation that his marriage of 30 years had disintegrated because of his wife's infidelity came as a rude shock, like a surcharge at a formerly surcharge-free ATM.
* The little boat gently drifted across the pond exactly the way a bowling ball wouldn't.
* McBride fell 12 stories, hitting the pavement like a Hefty bag filled with vegetable soup.
* From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie, surreal quality, like when you're on vacation in another city and Jeopardy comes on at 7:00 p.m. instead of 7:30.
* The hailstones leaped from the pavement, just like maggots when you fry them in hot grease.
* Long separated by cruel fate, the star-crossed lovers raced across the grassy field toward each other like two freight trains, one having left Cleveland at 6:36 p.m. traveling at 55 mph, the other from Topeka at 4:19 p.m. at a speed of 35 mph.
* They lived in a typical suburban neighborhood with picket fences that resembled Nancy Kerrigan's teeth.
* John and Mary had never met. They were like two hummingbirds who had also never met.
* He fell for her like his heart was a mob informant and she was the East River.
* Even in his last years, Grandpappy had a mind like a steel trap, only one that had been left out so long, it had rusted shut.
* Shots rang out, as shots are wont to do.
* The plan was simple, like my brother-in-law Phil. But unlike Phil, this plan just might work.
* The young fighter had a hungry look, the kind you get from not eating for a while.
* He was as lame as a duck. Not the metaphorical lame duck, either, but a real duck that was actually lame. Maybe from stepping on a land mine or something.
* The knife was as sharp as the tone used by Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Tex.) in her first several points of parliamentary procedure made to Rep. Henry Hyde (R-Ill.) in the House Judiciary Committee hearings on the impeachment of President William Jefferson Clinton.
* The ballerina rose gracefully en pointe and extended one slender leg behind her, like a dog at a fire hydrant.
* It was an American tradition, like fathers chasing kids around with power tools.
* He was deeply in love. When she spoke, he thought he heard bells, as if she were a garbage truck backing up.
* Her eyes were like limpid pools, only they had forgotten to put in any pH cleanser.
* She walked into my office like a centipede with 98 missing legs.
* Her voice had that tense, grating quality, like a generation thermal paper fax machine that needed a band tightened.
* Her face was a perfect oval, like a circle that had its two other sides gently compressed by a Thigh Master.
* It hurt the way your tongue hurts after you accidentally staple it to the wall.
* His thoughts tumbled in his head, making and breaking alliances like underpants in a dryer without Cling Free.
* He spoke with the wisdom that can only come from experience, like a Guy who went blind because he looked at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it and now goes around the country speaking at high schools about the dangers of looking at a solar eclipse without one those boxes with a pinhole in it.
* She grew on him like she was a colony of E. coli and he was room-temperature Canadian beef.
* She had a deep, throaty, genuine laugh, like that sound a dog makes just before it throws up.
* Her vocabulary was as bad as, like, whatever.
* He was as tall as a six-foot-three-inch tree.
* The revelation that his marriage of 30 years had disintegrated because of his wife's infidelity came as a rude shock, like a surcharge at a formerly surcharge-free ATM.
* The little boat gently drifted across the pond exactly the way a bowling ball wouldn't.
* McBride fell 12 stories, hitting the pavement like a Hefty bag filled with vegetable soup.
* From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie, surreal quality, like when you're on vacation in another city and Jeopardy comes on at 7:00 p.m. instead of 7:30.
* The hailstones leaped from the pavement, just like maggots when you fry them in hot grease.
* Long separated by cruel fate, the star-crossed lovers raced across the grassy field toward each other like two freight trains, one having left Cleveland at 6:36 p.m. traveling at 55 mph, the other from Topeka at 4:19 p.m. at a speed of 35 mph.
* They lived in a typical suburban neighborhood with picket fences that resembled Nancy Kerrigan's teeth.
* John and Mary had never met. They were like two hummingbirds who had also never met.
* He fell for her like his heart was a mob informant and she was the East River.
* Even in his last years, Grandpappy had a mind like a steel trap, only one that had been left out so long, it had rusted shut.
* Shots rang out, as shots are wont to do.
* The plan was simple, like my brother-in-law Phil. But unlike Phil, this plan just might work.
* The young fighter had a hungry look, the kind you get from not eating for a while.
* He was as lame as a duck. Not the metaphorical lame duck, either, but a real duck that was actually lame. Maybe from stepping on a land mine or something.
* The knife was as sharp as the tone used by Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Tex.) in her first several points of parliamentary procedure made to Rep. Henry Hyde (R-Ill.) in the House Judiciary Committee hearings on the impeachment of President William Jefferson Clinton.
* The ballerina rose gracefully en pointe and extended one slender leg behind her, like a dog at a fire hydrant.
* It was an American tradition, like fathers chasing kids around with power tools.
* He was deeply in love. When she spoke, he thought he heard bells, as if she were a garbage truck backing up.
* Her eyes were like limpid pools, only they had forgotten to put in any pH cleanser.
* She walked into my office like a centipede with 98 missing legs.
* Her voice had that tense, grating quality, like a generation thermal paper fax machine that needed a band tightened.
posted by david at 4/04/2005 11:49:00 PM
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