[Ads-l] "go pear-shaped"

[Robin Hamilton]

_GDoS_:  [Following PEAR-SHAPED adj.]:

        GO PEAR-SHAPED (v) (also "turn pear-shaped") of plans or schemes, to 
fail, to collapse.  Three citations, first from 1998.

I'd have thought it would have been earlier.  I'm pretty much familiar with 
the phrase.

Maybe it's a Brit thing ...

Robin

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-----Original Message----- 
From: Jonathan Lighter
Sent: Sunday, October 26, 2014 11:19 AM
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Subject: "go pear-shaped"

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Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
Poster:       Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
Subject:      "go pear-shaped"
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Wha'?

'Go bad,' for some reason. (Not just figuratively "sag into into a pear
shape," as one might imagine.)

http://www.thefilmpie.com/index.php?option=3Dcom_content&view=3Darticle&id=
=3D3100:review-lone-survivor&catid=3D36:reviews
:

This mission, described in the film as one with =E2=80=9Ca lot of moving pa=
rts=E2=80=9D,
went pear shaped after the four men lost their communications and were then
seen by a goat herder and his two young sons.

JL

--=20
"If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."

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