Any ants in your pants or butterflies in your stomach?

Carrying on with an insect theme, here are a couple more insect idioms: ‘to have ants in one’s pants’ and ‘to have butterflies in one’s stomach.’

‘To have ants in one’s pants’ means that the person is very anxious or impatient while ‘to have butterflies in one’s stomach’ means that a person experiences tension or excitement.

Their translation into other languages differs a great deal. So, for example, the French will replace ants with the fire and will say ‘to have the fire at the buttocks’, the Germans will assume that you have ‘‘bumblebees in your backside’’, while the Russians conclude that there is ‘‘an awl in your ass’’.

As for the butterflies, a few languages will replace them with fear, nerves or stage fright.

Another insect used in idioms is a fly – ‘dropping like flies, ‘‘like flies to manure’’. If you say that people are dropping like flies, it suggests that they are dying off, quitting or giving up something rapidly. ‘‘Like flies to manure’’ indicates that people are eagerly gathering in large numbers (though usually this phrase has negative connotations due to the word ‘‘manure’’).