January

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(as) cold as a well digger's ass (in January)

rude slang Extremely cold. Ugh, the winters here are cold as a well digger's ass—that's why I'm moving to Florida. Ack, don't touch me! Your hands are as cold as a well digger's ass in January!

(as) cold as a well digger's feet (in January)

Extremely cold. Ugh, the winters here are cold as a well digger's feet—that's why I'm moving to Florida. Ack, don't touch me! Your hands are as cold as a well digger's feet in January!

(as) slow as molasses in January

Exceptionally slow or sluggish; not fast at all. (The addition of "January," which is among the coldest months in the Northern Hemisphere, serves to intensify the meaning, as molasses is especially viscous in the cold.) This old laptop my dad gave me takes forever booting up, and then it runs as slow as molasses in January the whole time I use it! Come on, Becky, you're slow as molasses in January back there! Pick up the pace and keep up with the group.

slower than molasses in January

Exceptionally slow or sluggish; not fast at all. This old laptop my dad gave me takes forever booting up, and then it runs slower than molasses in January the whole time I use it! Come on, Becky, you're slower than molasses in January back there! Pick up the pace and keep up with the group.

It'll be a long day in January (when something happens).

Rur. Something will never happen. (There are fewer hours of daylight in January.) Tom: Maybe this will be the year that Mama treats herself to a nice vacation. Jane: Are you kidding? It'll be a long day in January when she does that! It'll be a long day in January when that car dealer gives an honest price.

*slow as molasses in January

and slower than molasses in January

very slow-moving. (*Also: as ~.) Can't you get dressed any faster? I declare, you're as slow as molasses in January. The traffic on the way to the concert was slower than molasses in January.

December, May and

A marriage between a young and a much older individual. This disparity was called January and May by Chaucer, January standing for the hoary frosts of old age and May for the young breath of spring. In Chaucer’s The Merchant’s Tale the young girl, May, marries January, a baron aged sixty. This fourteenth-century idea was transformed into December and May by the early 1600s (although January and May survived as well). December, of course, is not only cold but also comes at the end of the calendar year and so may provide a better analogy for late in life. “You doe wrong to Time, enforcing May to embrace December,” wrote Thomas Dekker (The Seven Deadly Sinnes of London, 1606).

slow as (slower than) molasses (in January)

Extremely dilatory. This simile is American in origin, dates from the midor late nineteenth century, and is a vivid one for anyone who has ever tried to pour cold molasses from one container into another. “He’s slower than molasses,” wrote J. W. McAndrews (Monologue, ca. 1880).

See also: molasses, slow

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References in periodicals archive ?

Many readers of the poem agree that these lines reveal the racist and sexist foundations of colonialism; about the poem's opening, however, there is some debate: "Januaries, Nature greets our eyes/exactly as she must have greeted theirs." This casual attribution of femininity to nature seems highly charged once we've read the final lines of the poem, and, along with Bishop's equation of "our" eyes with those of the Portuguese, it suggests that Bishop is aware that her own act of writing imposes values on the Brazilian landscape and culture.

Elizabeth Bishop's social conscience

Over the course of the forty Januaries, 2,034 measurable hourly rainfall observations were made at Lake Charles (Table 1).

Diurnal distribution of hourly rainfall events during January by synoptic weather types at Lake Charles, Louisiana

The basic data for this study come from the Displaced Workers Surveys (DWS) that were administered in the Januaries of 1984, 1986, and 1988.(3) The DWS surveys are supplements to the Current Population Survey (CPS) that are administered if the respondent answered "yes" to the following question: "In the past five years, have you lost or left a job because of a plant closing, an employer going out of business, a layoff from which you were not recalled, or other similar reasons?" For those answering positively to this question, the survey records information on the predisplacement job and the worker's experience since displacement.

Wage losses for displaced workers: is it really the firm that matters?

January 2017 NH SCE was over 2 million [km.sup.2] above average, which exceeds the average by greater than one standard deviation (SD) and ranks sixth highest of the past 51 Januaries. Eurasia (EU) maintained above-average SCE in February, ranking 19th highest, while SCE over North America (NA) decreased considerably to 15th lowest.

2. GLOBAL CLIMATE

Between the Januaries of 2017 and 2018 the rate stabilized at 5.6 percent.

Wenatchee County: (Chelan and Douglas Counties) Labor Area Summary--January 2018

An elderly person dies every seven minutes in the UK in winter due to houses which are too cold, with even mild Januaries showing an increase in heart attacks and strokes.

Elderly still dying in unheated homes

Spending typically drops significantly in January after the holidays are over, but the brighter economic projections in the latter half of 2014 and the improvement in consumer confidence could start 2015 on a higher spending note than in previous Januaries, especially if low gas prices persist into the new year.

U.S. Consumer Spending Strong, Mostly Unchanged in December

And there has been a couple of these systems which brought exceptionally high rainfall, some of the highest Wales and south England has seen - it's been double the average rainfall for January and one of the wettest Januaries on record."

Snow adds to misery as country prepares for another battering from storms and high tides

There were 21 signals passed at danger (SPADs) in January 2002 - 12 fewer than in January 2001 and 17 fewer than the average for the past six Januaries, the Health and Safety Executive said.

Fewer danger signals passed

They know that if there's one thing that can cheer even the gloomiest of Januaries it's bagging a new bikini and imagining yourself swanning around that beach in July.

SUMMER LOVING; LOOK: Susan Lee on why it's never too early to get into the holiday spirit

Januaries, Nature greets our eyes exactly as she must have greeted theirs: every square inch filling in with foliage - big leaves, little leaves, and giant leaves, blue, blue-green, and olive, with occasional lighter veins and edges, or a satin underleaf turned over; monster ferns in silver-gray relief, and flowers, too, like giant water lilies up in the air - up, rather, in the leaves - purple, yellow, two yellows, pink, rust red and greenish white; solid but airy; fresh as if just finished and taken off the frame.

Framing water: historical knowledge in Elizabeth Bishop and Adrienne Rich

Figure 2 shows the longitude-height cross section of zonal wind anomalies averaged over five Januaries corresponding to recent La Nina events.

Web-based Reanalysis Intercomparison Tools (WRIT) for analysis and comparison of reanalyses and other datasets

"I'm more confident in the Lane County housing market this January than I have been for any of the past five Januaries. The Lane County housing market is healing, it's healing on its own.

Foreclosures plummet

Not only are the Cascades dressed like a hula dancer at a winter carnival, Eugene is enjoying one of its warmest Januaries on record.

El Nino may leave basin drained

That's the earliest the soggy southern Willamette Valley might see a break from what will go down in the books as one of the wettest Januaries on record.