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Some confusing idioms

5 年前
What to do when you're not sure what's going on and you don't know if you' ve
got the wrong end of the stick or got your wires crossed'?

Confusing right? What's worse is when you learn that each expression means that you are confused by a situation.

- to get the wrong end of the stick
i.e holding a baseball bat, golf club, pool cue etc from the incorrect end and so you can't use them correctly and are obviously very confused.

I got the wrong end of the stick when my colleague who doesn't like his job told me he was leaving and I asked him when was the party? And he said 'No. I'm leaving the office to go home, not the company!'


- to get your wires crossed
i.e. when two telephone conversations get mistakenly connected to strangers and the speakers are then very confused.

My US business partner and I got our wires crossed when we arranged a meeting in Jakarta. She booked her flight for April 11th and I booked mine for November 4th.
Americans write dates differently to Europeans. Americans write month then day (4/11) and Europeans and write day first then month (11/4)!