Cliché: about as pleasant as a trip to the dentist

Meaning: anxiety inducers


Rewrite 1: about as pleasant as a trip to the principal's office
Rewrite 2: about as fun as a trip to the emergency room
Rewrite 3: all the joy of an appointment with the IRS
Rewrite 4: with the anticipation of a call from a telemarketer
Rewrite 5: with the calm of being surrounded by pickpockets


Comment: My thanks to author @jaypapasan for suggesting this challenging idiom, which may or may not rise to the definition of cliche. Jay says it attracts 77k hits on Google, a respectable showing. However, I couldn't find it on any searches that identified as a classic written cliche. Rather, it showed up as more of a cultural cliche, an idea that keeps popping up in references, which is that nothing is a fearful as a trip to the dentist. So perhaps our job here isn't so much to rewrite an idiom as to suggest there may be equal or worse things to fear as a visit with Dr. Tooth. 


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To make us all feel better about that trip to the dentist

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Cliché: in the cards, it's

Meaning: predicatble (example, scroll down), predicted (example)


Rewrite: Swami has fortold it
Rewrite: I found it in the Bible Code
Rewrite: you will find it in the star charts
Rewrite: I knew it! I could have run the table on it!
Rewrite: it was known before they shuffled the cards


Comment: This is more about foreknowledge than predictability.


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Cliché: I'm not getting any younger

Meaning: impatience; literally, I'm getting old waiting for you (example)


Rewrite: you take so long, my wrinkles are getting bigger than my boobs
Rewrite: I'm on my second pair of dentures waiting for you
Rewrite: the seasons seem to come and go with you
Rewrite: you might think I'm looking for dirt under my nails; I'm actually watching them grow
Rewrite: my alarm clock is having a nervous breakdown over here


Comment: Is it me, or does this sound like Billy Crystal playing the old man saying these lines? It isn't intentional. Maybe it's because the original idiom is kind of a punch line, anyway.


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Use humor in your writing
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Cliché: hump day

Meaning: Wednesday, day mid-week that gets you over the "hump" (example)


Rewrite 1: camel back day
Rewrite 2: road bump day
Rewrite 3: leaf pile day
Rewrite 4: Bell Curve day
Rewrite 5: high jump day
Rewrite 6: leap frog day


Comment: At first I thought of other kinds of humps or bumps or piles you get over, then I thought of obstacles you go over to get to the other side. There are lots of creative ways to say "I'm half way over the week."


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For when you run out of words
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Cliché: get into hot water

Meaning: get into trouble (example)


Rewrite: gulp hot coffee
Rewrite: dive into boiling water
Rewrite: skinny dip in a scalding pool
Rewrite: ride some white water
Rewrite: cross a river at a deep spot


Comment: There are lots of ways to use water as a metaphor for getting into trouble and I've attempted to use some of them here.


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How they might say it at sea

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Cliché: hit the hay, to

Meaning: go to bed (example)


Rewrite 1: hit the bale
Rewrite 2: hit the mattress
Rewrite 3: cuddle with the pillows
Rewrite 4: ruffle the linens
Rewrite 5: snuggle in z's
Rewrite 6: join the bed buds


Comment: I went for more colloquial wording here.


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Write more picturesquely
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Cliché: diamond in the rough, a

Meaning: someone lacking grace or refinement or with unpolished talent (example 1, example 2)


Rewrite 1: unbeveled diamond, an
Rewrite 2: unpolished stone, an
Rewrite 3: unvarnished oak
Rewrite 4: unchiseled granite
Rewrite 5: unsculpted marble
Rewrite 6: unrefined cotton


Comments: I went much further with this recasting than I thought I initially could. I'll bet there's even more you could accomplish.


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The art of rewriting
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