Mar 10th – Dilbert: Food Idioms

Hello everyone!

Today’s comic is Dilbert.  It has a lot of figurative language related to food.

Comic Breakdown

“Our meat and potatoes is knowing how to sandwich our product without causing the other vendors to beef.  We’ll get our just desserts when they drink the Kool – Aid.  Then we can have our cake and eat it too.” – Pointy Haired Boss to his employee

“Are you on a diet?” – employee

“Shut your pie hole.” – Pointy Haired Boss to his employee

What is going on?

Pointy Haired Boss is using a lot of idioms featuring food.  This causes his employee, who is confused, to question if he is hungry because of the number of food references he uses. 

Couch Potatoes (idiom for lazy people)

Here is the conversation in regular English.

“Our main business is to know how to market our product so that they have to be paired with a bigger product without causing our business partners to know.  We’ll get our reward (make more money) when they do not notice.  Then we can make money and enjoy our business success.

– Pointy Haired Boss to his employee

“Are you on a diet?” – Employee

“Shut your mouth.” – Pointy Haired Boss to his employee

Using Figurative Language

Using figurative language is a good way to make conversations more interesting and can help stress an idea.  However, using too many idioms can make a conversation confusing.  Not everyone understands all figures of speech, even very popular ones, because they are not literal in meaning. 

Why is this conversation funny?

The high use of food related idioms to refer to everything probably means that Pointy Haired Boss is very hungry. 

Here is a list of the idioms used in this comic and what they mean.

Meat and potatoes = the basics/main business or area of expertise

Sandwich = between something/to place something in between something (to hide it)

Beef = negative feelings/having the feeling of grudge, annoyance,  or anger towards something or someone

Just desserts = your deserved reward

Kool – Aid = believing something without thinking about it properly (this is how others can easily influence or trick you)

Have our cake and eat it too = having it all (getting what you want and enjoying it)

Pie hole = mouth

Today’s images are from here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.