Conference thebay::joyoflex

    As thick as two short planks, or as thick as a brick

    
    His [or Her] elevator doesn't go up to the top floor.
    
    Steve Kallis, Jr.

Seven shillings short of a pound.

					>>>==>PStJTT

    
    
    As bright as a burned-out lightbulb.

>  -- Playing with 51 cards in your deck.

   Variation: "Not playing with a full deck."
    
   -- Not all four legs of the table/chair reach/touch the floor.

    Half a bubble off plumb.
    
    From the cartoom strip Tumbleweeds:
    
    Scrambled his type.
    
    Flakier than a snowstorm.
    
    							Ann B.

        "Soft as a sneaker full of peanut butter"

        "Nothing but toys in the attic"

    having worked in the IBM world:
    
    he has a few pages that were intentionally left blank

    He/she has a screw loose
                   
    "       "  bats in the belfry

    Nuttier than a fruitcake
    Not firing on all cylinders (mechanic's usage)
    Has a loose wire (mechanic's usage, loose spark plug wire causing
                      the mind not to fire on all cylinders.)
    Nobody home upstairs
    A day late and a dollar short (implies indifference or incompetence
                      as well as mental lack)
    
    
    --bonnie

    Small room for rent upstairs
    

    Re: .10
    
    My (very English) mother (who had nothing to do with Montana) used a
    similar expression: 'as nutty as a fruitcake'. I guess the 'fruitcake'
    expression must be pretty widespread; my favourite line from 'The
    Taking of Pelham 123' was Walter Matthau's '...speaks with a heavy
    English accent - could be a fruitcake'. 
    
    Another: 'not all there'

    Variation on previous ones:

  One shy of a full deck.

  There's cobwebs in the attic.
  
Others:

  He's (she's) got a hole in his (her) marble bag.

  He (she) lost his (her) marbles.

  His (her) bucket's got a hole.

  His (her) wagon needs fixing.

  He's (she's) off his (her) rocker.

  He's (she's) gone off the deep end.

  He's (she's) all dressed up with no place to go.

  He's (she's) out to lunch.

  He's (she's) flown the coop.

  His (her) clock's been (being) cleaned.

  He's (she's) driving without a license.

  He's (she's) driving with eyes closed.

  He's (she's) stuck in neutral.

  His (her) gears are stripped.

  He's (she's) got a slow leak.

  He's (she's) running on empty.

  He's (she's) got a hole in his (her) roof.

  The windows are open, but the shades are drawn.

  There's wood in the fireplace but no smoke in the chimney.
                               

    ...playing poker with a pinochle deck.
    
    ...couldn't pour piss from a boot if the instructions were written on
    the heel (this one from LBJ -- except he probably said "was"). 
    
    Otnay ootay ightbray (often said softly in the person's presence).
    
    ...picks up notions like a gumdrop in lint.

    from a book, The Happy Time (about a french-canadian family)
    -paraphrased, of course:
    
    "Grandpapa is having many empty rooms in the head...soon whole
    apartments will be vacant..."
    
    
    also, heard around MIT, to describe a lack of mental cohesion
    
    %SYS-E-NOPARSE
    
    
    

    Heard this lunch from a friend describing a marketing reaction to
    a technical proposal (or was it the other way around)?
    
    "We couldn't make him understand what we were talking about.  I
    think he was having parity errors."
    
    --bonnie

    Here's one that decribes someone who speaks volubly and heedlessly;
    
    	"His brain never had a thought that his mouth couldn't use."

"Bright as a Toc-H lamp"

    ... before you ask:
    
.18> "Bright as a Toc-H lamp"
    
    "Toc-H" was World War I terminology; an abbreviation for "Talbot House"
    -- a place that housed an organization providing comforts to the troops.

    "His dipstick don't reach the oil."
    
    
    John M.

    ...off his/her trolley

    "left at the starting gate" 

    From a Physician:
    
    	"If he had a brain cell, we'd have to treat him 
         for a foreign body reaction."

    "That boy is as sharp as a bowling ball."

  His brain is about as large as a beebee going down a four lane highway...
  
  	heard recently during a lecture: "Oh, don't worry about him. 
  	He's just examining his eyelids for leaks."
  
  
  
  							Terza
  

    Digressing to anger/frustration from stupidity/insanity:
    
    	"Oh, don't tell that to soandso; he'll bugcheck."
    
    		Jon

    He can't walk and chew gum at the same time.
    
    If he had half a brain, it'd be lonely.
    
    His brains are in his feet, and the shoelaces are untied.
    
    His brains are in his backside, and got crushed to death.
    
    His brains are in his teeth, and the cavity needs to be filled.
    
    -bs

       ... he's as functional as a screen door on a submarine.
    

    ...if he/she sneezed, he/she'd blow his/her brains out.
    
    ...if he/she had spaghetti for brains, it'd be an improvement.
    
    Steve Kallis, Jr.

    they're on the right track....but the train left yesterday
    
    (for a wordless version, place finger in ear.  Pull out quickly
    and inhale between pursed lips.  Replace finger quickly and stop
    inhaling.  The idea is to intimate that there's nothing but a vacuum
    in there - and the moment you pull your finger away the vacuum is
    so strong it pulls it back in)
    
    
    
    -Jody
    

    Another wordless version: Stick a finger in your ear and wiggle
    it back and forth.  Now press your tongue into the opposite cheek
    and wiggle it back in forth in sync with the finger...looks like
    your finger went all the way to the cheek without hitting anything
    in between.
    
    Bill

Riding on his rims.

Reads the New Yorker, but skips the cartoons.

    Quick on the draw....with an empty gun
    
    Has sailboat fuel for brains (think about it)
    
    
    From Winnie the Pooh (paraphrased) - Some folks don't really have
    a brain, they have this sort of gray fluff that blew in by mistake...
    
    Mainspring needs winding
    
    5 shades short of a full pallette
    
    Worth his weight in whiffleballs
    
    (more Foghorn Leghorn) - mind like a steel trap....full of mice
    
    Duller than a doorstop
    
    Brain the size of a scuppernong seed
    
    (from Oscar Wilde) - has delusions of adequacy
    
    Function is not his forte
    
    
    

   "Has a mind like a steel trap.  Mangles everything that gets in it."

   -- Sam

    Said by stupid character who knows he's stupid:
    
    'I'm two weeks late and a quid [pound sterling] short.'
    
    (I'm not sure if this means what it seems to; I don't recognize the
    expression; but it sounds like an Anglicized version of one of
    bonnie's. Maybe the scriptwriter was being clever and 'foreseeing'
    the way the expression might be adopted - the story was set in the
    future.) 

    Mind like a steel trap....rusted shut.

	Mind like a steel seive!

Variation of .36.....

    Mind like a steel strap, snapped shut and rusty....

Also,

    If brains were dynamite, he wouldn't have enough to blow his nose!


Vic H.

    He or she ...
    
        is down a quart (of oil).
    
        is a couple short of a dozen.
    
    The lights are on, but nobody's home.

	He/She is about as useful as a doorknob on a banana.

-Jack

"His train of thought is still boarding at the station."
			-- "Calvin and Hobbes"

    "There are only toys in his/her attic."
    
    --_It_ by Stephen King
    
    Steve Kallis, Jr.

Heard this A. M. on a lottery commercial...

        "Not the brightest light in the string."

Pretty house, nobody home

Crazy as a loon

(One of my own, but it's slowly spreading:)  
Victim of bozon bombardment (i.e. a bozo)

With proper supervision, these people can live happy, useful lives.

    I don't think we got "mad as a hatter" yet.
    
    And I heard in the grocery store the other day, "It must have been
    something his mother ate."
    
    --bonnie

    This one's from "Cheers," in regard to Sam's many girlfriends, all
    of whom had, in Diane's words, IQs lower than their bust sizes and
    names ending in "i":
    
    "...and they let them vote, and drive cars!" (Said in a suitably
    astounded tone of voice.)
    
    -b

    Said of Capt. Mark Phil[l?]ips (reportedly by some guy name of Windsor)
    
    'We call him Fog - thick and wet'

    mouth in motion, brain out of gear
    
    as useful as a horn on a plow

    MLNOIS::HARBIG
                  re quand il etait bebe.......
                  Now I know where the Scots got "heed banger" from.
    
                                              Max

    has a rectal-cranial inversion
    
    Clay

    -.1 sometimes referred to as an acute case of "cranial rectitis"
    

    "missing when the nouse was handed out"   (Lancashire)

    Re .53:
    
    "nouse"?
    
    Steve Kallis, Jr.

    nouse - common sense, astuteness, worldliness, presence of mind
    
    At least that's what it meant in the South of Lancashire
    
    years ago
    
    Phillip

    Gk: nu omikron upsilon sigma
    
    No idea where the 'e' came from. Though Southerners understand the
    word, I've heard it _used_ more by Northerners (chiefly Yorkshiremen).
    
    b

    OK, I'll take the plunge.  I know some koine Greek, but couldn't tell
you what individual letters should signify.  Would you enlighten, please?
>   Gk: nu omikron upsilon sigma

    re: .-1
    > nu=N,omikron=O,upsilon=U,sigma=S

    Yes, yes, but is nu omicron upsilon sigma (something else) a meaningful
    acronym for something?  Fraternities and what-not claim two or three
    Greek letters for their own, to be interpreted as something witty, urbane,
    philosophical or scandalous; e.g. phi delta kappa = lovers of demented
    kardiologists, or some such.
    Of course, the original n.o.u.s.e? suggestion (back 4 or so replies) might
    have been merely tongue-in-cheek, which not only is a bit more difficult
    than Prof. Higgins' marbles-in-mouth, but makes this very reply totally ...

                                          Un-Note-worthily yours,

    N O U S, if I remember right, was just plain old 'mind'; but .-1
    raises an intriguing possibility. Urbane and witty Classical Greek
    acronyms don't trip lightly off my tongue, but I'll give it some
    thought ;-)
    
    Back to the topic.  I heard this in a 1956 film on TV last night:
    
    "Your head's drafty"

    In the battle of wits, he's unarmed...

    
    	I was talking with our chief technician one day, and 
    	every so often he'd run to the door of my office and yell
    
    		"RUBBER END UP!!!"
    
    	down the hallway. After a few repetitions of this, I 
    	asked him what this was all about, and he said,
    
    	"I've just hired a new tech, and the guy's so dumb, that
    	you have to tell him which end of the pencil to write with."
    
    	- Glinch

    Joan Rivers had this to say about Bo Derek:
    
    "She's so dumb, she had to study for her PAP test!"
    

    Doolally tap
    
    Phillip

Re:       He's so dumb, he studied for his blood test



	He was so dumb, they wrote TGIF on his shoes.

/Eric








(toes go in first)

      He has a room temperature I.Q. (comedic pause)  Celsius that is.
    
    
    Overheard at DECUS -
       She doesn't have all of her cache enabled.

    Mork (_Mork and Mindy_) - "She's checked out AND taken her baggage."

    Elevator does not stop on all floors.

Margaret Truman, daughter of President Harry S Truman, once gave a
recital which received a less than favorable review from the Washington
Post critic, Paul Hume.

Miss Truman's father dictated a letter to the critic that said, in part,

  "I have just read your lousy review buried in the back pages.  You
   sound like a frustrated old man who never made a success, an eight-ulcer
   man on a four ulcer job, and all four ulcers working.  I have never
   met you, but if I do you'll need a new nose and plenty of beefsteak
   and perhaps a supporter below.  Westbrook Pegler, a guttersnipe,
   is a gentleman compared to you.  You can take that as more of an
   insult than as a reflection on your ancestry."

They don't make presidents like that anymore.

Martin.

    ... elevenpence to the bob
    
    (bob=shilling, to which there were - until February 1971 - twelve
    pence [denarii])

    From the "Calvin and Hobbes" comic strip - 
    
    His train of thought is still boarding back at the station.

	From my Australian son-in-law:

	Mad as a two-bob watch.

    I don't remember seeing
    
    
    	He has a screw loose.
    

    
    
    His bread is buttered on the wrong side.
    
    One my grandmother used.

    Two vouchers short of a toaster
    
    Two twigs short of a tree
    
    Ten pence in the shilling (pace -2 or so) (when shillings had 12
    pence)
    
    One more brain cell and he could be a cactus
    
    Got dropped on his head as a baby

     I once described a rather dense person as having "The brains
     of a head of lettuce."
    
     I once described a group as having "The IQ of a bed of flowers."
                                                    
    					andrew

    Two pages short of a script	      (BBC Radio)

    From Winston Churchill:
    
    "...a modest man (woman), with much tobe modest about."
    
    From someone else:
    
    running a quart low.
    
    Another from Winnie:
    
    Every time he opens his mouth, he subtracts from the sum of human
    knowledge.
    
    			Gregg

    Re .79:
    
>   From Winston Churchill:
    
>   "...a modest man (woman), with much tobe modest about."
    
    The question of gender does not arise ... Churchill was referring 
    specifically to Clement Atlee.

"She's so dumb it takes her an hour and a half to watch '60-minutes'".

Pete

    He/she survived the information explosion without a scratch.

    He has a one-track mind...
    
    DERAILED!

    From Down-Under (I'm told)
    	* Got a couple of Kangaroos missing in the top paddock.
    
    From Alice in Wonderland ?
    	* Mad as a March hare
    
    From an exasperated colleague
    	* Bottomlessly stupid !
    
    and an original from my wife (she tells me)
    
    
    
    ** The index doesn't match the contents **
    
    
    
    and I'm trying to refine the notion of the syntax being OK but the
    processes wont execute.
    
    anyone like to help 
    
    William
    
    

    Heard while watching the movie "Footloose"
    
    He doesn't have all his dogs barking.

    two bricks short of a load
    
    Strong like bull, smart like ox..
    
    As clever as a hockey stick.
    
    Scooter

    
      "About as sharp as a sack of wet mice."
      
      "You're built too low son, the fast ones go over your head. 
    You've got a hole in your glove son, I keep pitching 'em and
    you keep missing 'em."
    
    John

    "Two decks short of a studio"

    BBC Radio 1
    
    Nick :-)

    
    
      Somebody blew His/Her pilot light out.
    
    
    John
    

    
    Half a bubble off plumb.
    
    Dick
    

As Charles Emerson Winchester III   once said...

	Well, my 15 Watt friend -

    From the "Frank & Ernest" comic strip in this morning's paper:

    "Yes, you do seem to have the Theatre in your blood, sir, but
    there appears to be restricted flow to the balcony."

    Sid

    She's two sandwiches short of a pic-nic.
    
    (The object _was_ a woman, but it works either way).
    
    b

    From a BOSTON cab driver talking about a driver from out of town
    in BOSTON traffic.
    
    That's why he drives like that, "he's from NEW JOEWZEE!

    
    And then there's
    
    
    "If brains were holy water, s/he wouldn't have enough to baptize
    a mosquito."
    
    

    Or, from Black Adder Goes Forth....
    
    Something like...
    
    "You've got such a tiny brain that if a Cannibal took off the top of
    your head he wouldn't have enough to evenly cover a small water biscuit"
    
    
    R|tch^d

    That's a sign a man's saddle's startin' to slip.
            -- Festus ( _Gunsmoke_ )


    He's the reason some animals eat their young.


    A couple cans short of a six-pack.


    Nerves of steel
    Body of iron
    Brain of stone

    
    Personally, my fav is -
    
    One tiger token short of a pop up toaster.
    
    JohnO.

re: previous title:  -< Hello, I think I like this conf. >-
Is that meant to be synonymous with "six bricks ..."?

Methinks you've read too many lexy limericks.

    Since I can't think of an equivalent for men, I guess this one is
    sexist:
    
    Her IQ was lower than her Wasserman.

    Why sexist?  The Wasserman test checks for syphilis, which is an
    equal-opportunity disease.
    
    					andrew

    He's missing a couple of chromosomes.

    
    More lace holes in his boots than neurons.

    If *ssholes could fly, he'd be at the airport.
    
    Lee

    Your about as much use as a chocolate fireguard!
    
    	

    Give him/her a brain and he/she would be dangerous
    
    One more braincell and he/she could pass as a plant
    
    As useful as a fart in a cullender (sp?)

     Just for fun I complied a list a few years ago (which I put away 
     & don't know where it is now  :-)).  Here's the ones I can recall 
     which were not mentioned in previous replies:

     ...one brick short of a full load  (favorite version)
     ...stove is lit, but the pilot light is out
     ...one egg short of a dozen
     ...porch light's on, but no-one's home
     ...doors are unlocked, but the porch light is out
     ...comin' in on three engines

     And the crasser "...goes over like a fart in church" 
     and 
     "...as useless as two t*ts on a bull".  (Which brings up the 
    question:  Is one enough, and two overkill?  ;-))
     
     And since there are some Foghorn fans out there, here are more
     Foghorn put-downs:

     You remind me of the road from L.A. to Pasadena: no curves
     (I think it was L.A....)

     You remind me of Paul Revere's ride: a little light in the belfry

     						Don
                 

    Nuttier than a sh!thouse rat...

    Overheard at the coffee station a few minutes ago:
    
    "Yeah, he'd starve if he had to microwave his own TV dinner."
    
    --bonnie

    A subtle insult hidden in some open insults, from _The_Economist_
    (24 Feb-2 Mar '90 issue, page 22):
    
    	Everyone knows that Nancy Reagan found Raisa Gorbachev
    	intolerable: bossy (a touch of the pots and kettles, there),
    	meddling (a suggestion of motes and beams, perhaps) and 
    	brainy.
    
    
    					-John Bishop

    swapped out (or paged out)
    
    stuck in autoboot
    
    not operating on all channels
    
    has a few short circuits
    
    missing a few bits
    
    driving on three wheels
    
    not operating on all cylinders
    
    braindead

    The engine's running, but nobody's driving.
    
    He had a bum transplant, but it rejected him.
    
    His brain has a branch random instruction.
    

    When they were passing out brains, he thought they said "trains", and 
    said he wasn't interested.
    
    Linda

    When they passed out heads, he thought they said "bed", and he asked for
    a soft one.

    `Two sardines less than a full shoal'
    
    In sound lexicographical tradition, I'm recording the version I heard.
    I'd prefer `Two sardines short of a shoal' or maybe `pilchards'. Of
    course, `sharks' would make the alliteration neater, but do you get
    shoals of them?
    
    b

	One page shy of a working set.

	He's off today -- a thought struck him.

	If he had an idea, it would die of loneliness.

	There are those in whom the spark of intelligence is of a somewhat 
	lower voltage.



Ian S.

    re .119:  My list of collective nouns does not specify one for sharks,
              probably due to the shark typically being a lone hunter.
    
    						Don 

>   re .119:  My list of collective nouns does not specify one for sharks,
>             probably due to the shark typically being a lone hunter.

This is a typo for "loan", right?  - - - - - - - - - - - - ^

    He's a rower who can't get both oars in the water.

    The nearest he'll ever get to a brainstorm is a slight drizzle...
    
                                           - Rik -

    One manager to another, while waiting for a printout at the laser
    printer outside my office:
    
    "I don't mean to be critical, I suppose he's doing the best he
    can, but don't you think he's . . . falling about a foot short of
    the whole nine yards?"
    
    --bonnie

    His/Her brain is write only.
    
    He/She has no load device.
    
    He/She is a NOOP.
    
    His/Her feet don't reach the ground.

    Space available.
    
    
    E Grace

    Knitting with only one needle  -  Queen 'Innuendo' CD
    
    Nick

    Two sandwiches short of a picnic.

...sharp as a marble.

This also works for describing cutting tools.  :-)

-d

Dumber than a box of rocks....

    From "Who's Harry Crumb?":
    
    	Body of Steel, Brain of Stone

    One heard recently, "His stairs don't quite reach the landing".

    Some more....apologies for any repeats.
    
    About as welcome as a fart in a spacesuit.
    About as welcome as rabies in a guide dogs home
    About as much use as a hatstand for a moose.
    About as much use as a wet match.
    About as much use as a gnats foreskin in a whirlwind.
    About as much use as an ashtray on a motorbike.
    About as much use as a one-legged man in a bum kicking contest.
    
    And some more when I think of them.
    
    Roy.

    I don't remember the name of the woman pundit who was reviewing an
    actresses performance and said,

    	"She ran the gamut of emotion from A to B."

    It was Dorothy Parker.
    
    	Jon

    ...commenting on Katherine Hepburn.

    Yeah, I remember now.  Why can't I ever remember those names when I go
    to enter the note?

It was also Daffy Duck, speaking of the Wicked Wolf, on 
'The Loony, Loony Bugs Bunny Movie'.

	I wonder who came up with it first?

		-- C

    Dorothy Parker was first.
    
    					andrew

I thought the remark was made about Helen Hayes.

    I doubt it referred to Helen Hayes.  Ms Hayes has for decades been
    recognized as one of the most skilled actors to have appeared on boards
    during the 20th century.
    
    The quotation is attributed in Bartlett's 15th to Dot Parker, but the
    referent is unnamed.  I too seem to remember that it referred to Kate
    Hepburn.
    
    -d

    I also remembered it as Parker on Hepburn when I wrote .139. However, I
    wasn't *sure* it was Hepburn, so I checked in Bartlett's, and also
    found the unnamed referent, so I left it out. Now, so many of us
    remember it as being Hepburn, I'm much more confident of it.
    
    	Jon

    A few co-ordinates short of a bearing.
    
    
    
    Ian.
    

    Not in any known taxon.

    A few sheets short of a good wipe.
    

    Not only was it Katherine Hepburn, but I believe it was a review of her
    performance in the Broadway play "The Philadelphia Story."
    
    E Grace

    Barry Took
    The News Quiz - BBC Radio 4 (14 September 1991, repeated 16 Sept)

	From a novel by Robert Coover:

	"That turnip-head lacks a Friday; his stupid little wheels are out 
of place! ...  (He) does lack a bit of salt in his pumpkin."

	Dave

     Some of his pages are stuck together.

		He's past his sell-by date.

	(Heard that, in French, this week.)
	
	Delia

       Terry Pratchett writes in Guards! Guards! Guards! one of his 
       Discworld novels:
    
       "... felt he was now just one dribble short of an asylum..."
    
    Rathole:
    
       In the same book he describes coffee as being:
    
        "making-love-in-a-canoe flavour"
    
       next page for the translation (clean)

       close to water

Heard this morning, a quote from "Moly Ivens Can't Say That, Can She?", 
regarding some Texas pol:

	"If he was any dumber, you'd have to water him twice a day.

Larry

    From Margaret Truman's "Murder in the National Cathedral":
    
    	"His elevator doesn't reach the top story."
    
    (I had to read *something* on that 15-hour plane ride.)

From:	PLOUGH::KINZELMAN 				11-FEB-1992 12:07:29.99
To:	SSDEVO::EGGERS

    It's hard to remember sometimes that somebody must
    make up the tips of the bell shaped curve!

    Last night on "The Tonight Show", Robin Williams described Dan Quayle
    as being "one taco short of a combination plate."
    
    -Tom

    
    He has the intelligence of a small kitchen appliance.

    His quilt is missing a few feathers.
    
    							Ann B.

British Liberal Democrat MP Simon Hughes described a Conservative MP's
comments on the Rio summit as:

"One tree short of a rain forest"

Jon

	Heard recently ....

	"He's not the brightest light on the Christmas tree"

    He can't sing, "99 bottles of beer on the wall," without
    a calculator.

    
              <<< QUOKKA::DISK$ARCH2:[NOTES$LIBRARY2]OZ.NOTE;1 >>>
                           -< The Lands Down Under >-
================================================================================
Note 8.49                             slang                             49 of 50
FUTURS::BAKER                                        67 lines  27-AUG-1992 08:31
                          -< STUFF FROM THE OUTBACK. >-
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    
    LIVING IN THE OUTBACK OF AUSTRALIA YOU COME ACROSS SOME COLORFUL
PEOPLE, AND THEIR SLANG. THIS IS SOME OF THE STUFF I'VE HEARD LIVING
IN THE NORTHERN TERRITORY, I'M NOT SURE WHERE IT COMES FROM BUT SOME
OF ITS GOT TO BE LOCAL STUFF.

    ...
    
HE'S GOT A FEW ROOS LOOSE IN THE TOP PADDOCK :- WEIRD PERSON
SANDWICH SHORT OF A PICNIC                   :- WEIRD PERSON
STUBBY SHORT OF A SIX PACK                   :- WEIRD PERSON
    
    ...

"Two sandwiches short of a Picnic"

Larry

    >"Two sandwiches short of a Picnic"
    
    Didn't it used to be one sandwich?
    
    Well OK, I can play that game too.
    
    "Aleph-null sandwiches short of a picnic."

    It's an old one, but it doesn't seem to be in here:
    
    	He's not ready for prime time.

    G'day,
     From an Australian (rugby league)football coach of a particular
    opponent of whom he bemoans the lack of common sense....


    "He's so clever he can name a horse in nine languages and then he goes
    and  buys a cow to ride on"

    Just saw this:
    
    "Three fries short of a Happy Meal."

    From a Dave Barry column:

    ...I received dozens of letters from readers claiming that they, too,
    have had encounters with toilet snakes.  Even if we allow for the fact
    that a certain percentage (94) of the people who read this column are,
    to use psychological terminology, a few croutons short of a salad, we
    see that this snake problem is not confined to Oklahoma.

    A few typos short of a random number generator

    >> A few typos short of a random number generator
    
    Hmmm.  The vast majority of the previous entries have been synonymous
    with, "He could easily be more intelligent".  This one seems to be
    synonymous with, "He is almost totally stupid," and therefore seems to
    express considerably less intelligence than the others.

    ... to be provably random, so I take the "few typos short" bad rap as
    showing that the person is almost sophisto enough to be elegant, but
    yet fails because of some slovenly shortcoming...
    

    .176 has a reasonable interpretation, but I intended the meaning for
    cases where randomness was not desired.  And I intended it to mean
    something along the lines of:  with a bit more intelligence they'd be
    stupid; or, with a bit more accuracy there would be zero correlation
    between their statements and the truth.

    Heard on BBC Radio 4 this morning.
    
    Nick

    G'day,
    
    > -< a.k.a. clewless >- (sic)
    
     since a clew is part of a sail, maybe we could try a different tack...
    
    How about 'one reef short of a mainsail'
    
    or 
    
    one link short of an anchor chain
    
    or
    
    one splice short of a mainbrace?
    
    
    
    derek
    
    

    One fathom short of a cable

    A German friend told me they have an expression which
    translates as:
    
    "He doesn't have all his cups in the cupboard."
    
    and with deference to .127, .132, .167, .168, .168, I've also
    heard:
    
    "Half a sandwich short of a picnic"
    
    ed

"... a couple of whiskers short of a full beard"

In reference to a male, but it might be just as amusing applied to a female.

    Why would anyone ever want a vegetable in a boat?
    
    ed

Don't you hate it when they forget to bring the bodies in?

By the way, check out 61.22 for a particularly gross one.

Here's one that I haven't seen yet.

One character shy of a word wrap

I haven't decided whether it's good or bad.

Wook