Hi this is Tutor Nick P and this is Idioms 232. The idiom today is for the
birds. Okay. Let's take a look at the note here.
If someone says something is for the birds, he or she means that something is
stupid , worthless, or completely undesirable. Okay. Let's take a look...
Continue here. The origin of this term comes from the idea that birds used to
eat seeds that were often left in horse poo poo. Remember before cars became
ubiquitous. Ubiquitous means you know, everywhere all over the place. There was
a lot of horse poo poo on the streets. Yeah. So of course you know, horses were
the main form of transportation at one time. So just like they say here. People
could observe birds picking out the seeds. So they can actually see them land at
the horse poo poo you know , maybe they were thinking what are you doing ? That's
poo poo. You shouldn't be eating that. But of course, the birds went down there. Yeah.
They thought may you know, pretty good. Why not ? So they've got some free seeds.
Okay. So it originally started out as a more
vulgar term. You know, so people used to actually say shit for the birds. So
that's not so nice . That's why I've been trying to say poo poo. Because poo poo
is not so vulgar. Now we only say something is for the birds. So that's the
way we usually use it or something is strictly for the birds. Like strictly means
like limited just to the birds. You know, that's just for them. Nobody else
would want that. So again, remember if something is for the birds,
it's either stupid, worthless, or completely undesirable. Yeah. Regular
people they don't really want the horse poop. That's very undesirable. Okay. So
let's, let's look at some examples here. Example number one. Watching that soap
opera is for the birds. It is a complete waste of time. Yeah. This person probably
feels like it's stupid or maybe they might even feel
that it's kind of worthless to watch it. You're not gaining too much value from
it. Or number two here. Collecting bottle caps is for the birds. They will never
have any real value. So if you wanted it to ever sell it to another collector...
Bottle caps there's not many out. They're not going to pay much. If they pay
anything. If you are going to collect something. You should collect something
that will grow in value. So again when they say you know, this is for the birds,
they probably really here definitely mean worthless. You know, what's the point ?
No need to do it. Okay. Let's look at the last one. Playing that violent video game
because you know, maybe there are some good video games. Maybe there are some
educational video games. Well playing that violent video game is for the birds.
It will only corrupt your mind. So this is one way you might think it's
completely undesirable. This is something you shouldn't do. Maybe it will affect
you in a negative way or affect your your thinking or your emotions in a
negative way. Anyway I hope you got it. I hope it was clear. Thank you for your
time. Bye-bye.