paddle
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be up a/the creek (without a paddle)
slang To be in a challenging or troublesome situation, especially one that cannot be easily resolved. I have no savings, so if I get fired from my job, I'll be up the creek without a paddle. Shouldn't we stop for gas? We'll be up a creek if the car dies on that desolate road ahead.
paddle (one's) own canoe
To act independently. Now that you're 30, people expect you to paddle your own canoe—you can't just live with your parents forever.
up a/the creek (without a paddle)
slang In a challenging or troublesome situation, especially one that cannot be easily resolved. I have no savings, so if I get fired from my job, I'll be up the creek without a paddle. Shouldn't we stop for gas? We'll be up a creek if the car dies on that desolate road ahead.
up poo creek (without a paddle)
slang In a challenging or troublesome situation, especially one that cannot be easily resolved. I have no savings, so if I get fired from my job, I'll be up poo creek without a paddle. Shouldn't we stop for gas? We'll be up poo creek if the car dies on that desolate road ahead.
up the river
1. To, in, or at prison. It is extremely gratifying to see these wealthy white-collar criminals being sent up the river for stealing from so many people. I actually had better conditions up the river than I ever did in the slums where I grew up.
2. In a difficult, troubling, or dangerous situation, especially one from which it is impossible or extremely difficult to extricate oneself. Often followed by "without a paddle." A less common variant of the phrase "up a/the creek (without a paddle)." We're really going to be up the river without a paddle if we run out of gas out here in the desert. How did we get ourselves so far up the river like this? There's no way we can pay back this much debt.
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms. © 2022 Farlex, Inc, all rights reserved.
paddle one's own canoe
Fig. to do something by oneself; to be alone. I've been left to paddle my own canoe too many times. Sally isn't with us. She's off paddling her own canoe.
up the river
Sl. in prison. (Underworld.) Gary was up the river for a couple of years, but that doesn't make him an outcast, does it? The judge who sent him up the river was indicted for accepting bribery. If Gary had only known sooner!
McGraw-Hill Dictionary of American Idioms and Phrasal Verbs. © 2002 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.
paddle one's own canoe
Be independent and self-reliant, as in It's time Bill learned to paddle his own canoe. This idiom alludes to steering one's own boat. [c. 1800]
up a creek
Also, up shit creek; up the creek (without a paddle). In trouble, in a serious predicament, as in If the check doesn't arrive today I'm up a creek, or The car wouldn't start, so I was up the creek without a paddle. This slangy idiom conjures up the image of a stranded canoeist with no way of moving (paddling) the canoe. President Harry S. Truman used the first term in a letter in 1918. The first variant is considered vulgar.
up the river
To or in prison, as in They sent him up the river for five years. This phrase originally referred to Sing-Sing Prison, on the Hudson River about 30 miles north of New York City. So used from about 1890 on, it was broadened to apply to any prison by the early 1900s.
The American Heritage® Dictionary of Idioms by Christine Ammer. Copyright © 2003, 1997 by The Christine Ammer 1992 Trust. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.
paddle your own canoe
If you paddle your own canoe, you control what you want to do without anyone's help or interference. With no one managing him, he was basically left to paddle his own canoe. As far as the rest of Europe is concerned we've just got to paddle our own canoe.
Collins COBUILD Idioms Dictionary, 3rd ed. © HarperCollins Publishers 2012
be up the creek without a paddle
be in severe difficulty, usually with no means of extricating yourself from it. informalOften shortened to be up the creek , this expression is recorded in the mid 20th century as military slang for ‘lost’ (for example, while on a patrol).
paddle your own canoe
be independent and self-sufficient. informalThis expression has been in figurative use from the early 19th century: it was the title of a popular song by Sarah T. Bolton in 1854 .
up the river
to or in prison. informal, chiefly North AmericanThis phrase originated with reference to Sing Sing prison, which is situated up the Hudson River from the city of New York.
Farlex Partner Idioms Dictionary © Farlex 2017
up the creek without a paddle
verbup a creek
verbup the river
mod. in prison. (Underworld.) The judge who sent him up the river was indicted for accepting bribery. If Gary had only known sooner!
McGraw-Hill's Dictionary of American Slang and Colloquial Expressions Copyright © 2006 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
up the river
Slang In or into prison.
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.
paddle one's own canoe, to
To be independent and self-reliant. The analogy to steering one’s boat is very old indeed; Euripides drew it in his play Cyclops (ca. 440 b.c.). Canoes being largely a Western Hemisphere conveyance, this particular version of the term is American in origin. It dates from about 1800. An early appearance in print occurs in Frederick Marryat’s Settlers in Canada (1840). A few years later Harper’s Monthly (May 1854) published the following ditty: “Voyager upon life’s sea, to yourself be true, And whate’er your lot may be, paddle your own canoe.” It became a popular music-hall song.
up a/the creek (without a paddle)
In deep trouble; in a tight spot. Also put more baldly as up shit creek, this expression is almost certainly of American vintage from the early twentieth century, but the exact origin has been lost. Joseph Heller used it in Catch-22 (1961): “You really are up the creek, Popinjay.”
The Dictionary of Clichés by Christine Ammer Copyright © 2013 by Christine Ammer
up the river
In jail. The infamous Sing Sing Correctional Facility, located in the town of Ossining thirty miles north of New York City, sits on the Hudson River shoreline. Any criminal convicted in a New York court and sentenced to be imprisoned there was sent “up the river.” The phrase, made popular in gangster movies, began to be applied to other prisons in the country, whether or not the cells boasted of a river view. “Up the river” should not be confused with “sold down the river,” meaning “deceived” and derived from the antebellum practice of Northern slaveholders selling troublesome slaves down the Mississippi River for a life of endless toil on cotton plantations.
Endangered Phrases by Steven D. Price Copyright © 2011 by Steven D. Price