What are idioms?

Every language has idioms, and the English language has
thousands of them. You cannot understand them because the group of words together has little, often nothing, to do with
the meanings of the words taken one by one.

For instance, to bark up the wrong tree means to have the wrong idea about something. Today, the phrase has nothing to do with a dog or a tree, but hundreds of years ago, it actually did.

In order to understand a language, you must know what the idioms in that language mean. If you try to figure out the meaning of the idiom word by word you're likely to get nowhere -- you will get befuddled or confused. You have to know the 'hidden' meaning. In Birds of a Feather the hidden meanings are revealed.

Idioms show a language's sense of humor; they're your language's ticklish spots so learning them can be lots of fun. I hope you'll enjoy them as much as we do.