I asked my colleagues here at work to shout out a few phrases that might come in handy when describing someone who is . . . not so clever as Oscar Wilde. Here is the first round. More to come as I gather them. Feel free to send in your own. You know what we’re talking about . . . .
A sandwich short of a picnic
Not the brightest bulb
Not the sharpest knife in the drawer
Elevator doesn’t go all the way to the top
A few cards short of a full deck
Not firing on all six cylinders
Few clowns short of a circus
Bread not baked all the way through
Fell out of the stupid tree and hit every branch on the way down
Forgot to pay his brain bill
Not the brightest light in the harbor
The light’s on but no one’s home
A few screws short of a hardware store
A few cards short of a deck
A few fries short of a Happy Meal
About as sharp as a marble
Only has one oar in the water
Smart as a bag of rocks
A burger short of a combo meal
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An E-Verser writes in: “Don’t forget the phrase, with implications beyond intellect, often used to describe our president:
‘All hat and no cattle.'”
A few heroes short of a justice league.
A few ‘roos loose in the top paddock
A few bricks shy of a load
Not the sharpest tool in the shed
An IQ below room temperature
Left the store without all the groceries
The wheel’s spinning, but the hamster’s dead
And this one:
Some drink from the fountain of knowledge, some just gargle.
Not the brightest crayon in the box
My grandfather was a depression-era street urchin as a kid. After boxing for a few years and doing odd delivery jobs, he landed a job in a paper factory here in south philly where he worked the remainder of his life. He was a great story teller, and often recounted the story of an co-worker at the factory who had a piece of clothing caught in a machine and watching the guys neck and shoulder get slit by machinery. Happy stuff. (The guy survives the accident.) Whenever telling the story, grandpop would introduce this guy as “Speedy Joe” and then comment parenthetically that “we called him ‘speedy’ because, you know, he wasn’t exactly the quickest cat in the alley.” I like the irony more than the phrase.