Beno88 wrote:"So I’m absolutely chomping at the bit"
Champing. It's champing at the bit. Time to stop sounding like you're still at Collingwood Nathan.
Good to see his parents getting value for that Haileybury education.
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Beno88 wrote:"So I’m absolutely chomping at the bit"
Champing. It's champing at the bit. Time to stop sounding like you're still at Collingwood Nathan.
If Nathan wants to chomp then let him chompBeno88 wrote:"So I’m absolutely chomping at the bit"
Champing. It's champing at the bit. Time to stop sounding like you're still at Collingwood Nathan.
So that's how they all lost those teeth?Beno88 wrote:"So I’m absolutely chomping at the bit"
Champing. It's champing at the bit. Time to stop sounding like you're still at Collingwood Nathan.
http://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/chomping+at+the+bitbe chomping at the bit (redirected from chomping at the bit)
be chomping at the bit
To be impatient and/or eager for something to happen or over some delay. Used to liken someone to an overexcited horse straining against its bit (the metal piece of the harness that fits between its jaws). I was chomping at the bit for the game to start. After two hours of waiting in the airport lobby, we were chomping at the bit to finally get on the plane.
champ1 (tʃæmp, tʃɒmp) also chomp
v., v.t.
1. to bite upon or grind, esp. impatiently: The horses champed the oats.
2. to crush with the teeth and chew vigorously or noisily; munch.
3. to mash; crush.
v.i.
4. to make vigorous chewing or biting movements with the jaws and teeth.
These are the senses meant in the idiom champing at the bit, which refers to the tendency of some horses to chew on the bit when impatient or eager. In its figurative sense, it means to show impatience while delayed, or just to be eager to start.
Related
Raring to
The idiom is usually written chomping at the bit, and some people consider this spelling wrong. But chomp can also mean to bite or chew noisily (though chomped things are often eaten, while champed things are not), so chomp at the bit means roughly the same as champ at the bit.
In fact, chomp, which began as a variant of champ, is alive in English while the biting-related sense of champ is dead outside this idiom, so it’s no wonder that chomping at the bit is about 20 times as common as champing at the bit on the web. Champing at the bit can sound funny to people who aren’t familiar with the idiom or the obsolete sense of champ, while most English speakers can infer the meaning of chomping at the bit.
Still, if you’re writing for school or for readers who are versed in English, champing at the bit is probably the safer choice.
You forgot the next bit (haha) - As long as the chomps a champ and not a chump, who cares?supersaints wrote:As long as the chomps a champ, who cares?