Sayings

Until explained yes - it may be that the explanation can be provided by others or by deducing it oneself.  In order to deduce it oneself this requires the meaning of the words to be included in one's vocabulary.  Then making the connection to a meaning of the saying which often addresses a common issue of life.

In this situation we may be exploring that for autistic people there exists a relative tendency to interpret words, phrases, and concepts in their most straightforward, non-figurative sense.  It may be that this tendency makes autistic people more likely to find sayings the subject of fixation.

To directly answer your first question in your post.  Yes I recall becoming especially interested in sayings in my early twenties.  As a source of wisdom they are a useful resource.  In my early twenties especially, I was pretty desperate for sources of wisdom - perhaps to help me navigate the neurotypical world as an undiagnosed autistic person.  Perhaps just because I found it interesting that it is possible to encapsulate common human situations in such a practical, memorable and widely shared way.  I think that because it requires a little extra effort to understand them it makes them more memorable and exchangeable.  Perhaps also because they are less direct they are less "blunt" and therefore more easily exchanged between two people too.  They are passed on as a shared social wisdom rather than a direct individual statement which may seem too personal for some situations of communication.

Anyway, if I may, I would like to say: "more power to your elbow" to you Expecto_Patronum  by which I mean to say: I approve of your efforts and hope they will be successful.

:-)

English is weird is my only response to that.

I get them when it’s explained

like a busman’s holiday (busman do you mean bus driver?)

also why is it pronounced bus and man but as one word it’s bus mun 

I always have an image of a pot screaming at a kettle saying your black and rhe kettle being like dude thats really racist 

You can’t have you cake and eat it is so weird to me

also dont put all your eggs in one basket 

sure ok but what is the weight limit of the basket and how much do the eggs weigh is rhe basket big enough for my eggs? I need the maths please 

O YouTube theres an Irish or northern Irish man who cant say the words “theres no need for me to be here today” it’s so funny and you just reminded me of it 

Oh I see. Words are confusing.

 a pick as well as a being a choice is also a type of implement ( a pick axe) for digging with - albeit a pick is used to break up material more than cut and lift it like a spade is - so the confusion is about there being 3 spades and no pick to pick as it were :-)

:-)

If it's designed for digging then it's a spade. They can have a flat end rather than a point but it will still be sharp enough to dig into the ground. Shovels are designed for carrying. They can be small or large but wouldn't be much use digging as the end is blunter. 

I've never heard of a Cornish shovel so I don't know how that fits in.

I don't think I know that joke.

I understand the tricky thing about literal thinking and sayings being tricky to make sense of until explained - I was told to "follow that lorry"  when learning to drive with my boss - I did and ended up with the wing mirror of the vehicle I was driving getting knocked off as I did so without stopping to let another lorry come around the corner with enough space!  I suspect that the joke about confusing someone by putting 3 spades against a wall and asking the person to take their pick might be an interesting thing to consider?  best wishes

That is interesting. I call the one with a flat end a spade for digging a garden. A shovel is smaller like we used to use to shovel coal from the bucket to put in the coal scuttle to bring indoors. Then to confuse matters there is a Cornish Shovel which is a long handled spade with a pointy end. That is also useful for gardening.

Sorry I see you originally phrased it clearly but I had scanned over it too quickly. Yes, it reminds me of a more recently emerged phrase/saying, “It is what it is”. I don’t understand that one.

I used to be very confused about sayings, but I have learned most of them now, probably because I have had more years of practice than you.

There is a Northern Irish saying that some people use to describe someone with a downturned mouth or a long face, such as they would have upon receiving disappointing news:

”She/he had a face like a Lurgan spade” or “You have a face like a Lurgan spade”.

It isn’t used usually used in an offensive manner today. Lurgan is a town in Northern Ireland and Lurgan spades are of a specific size and shape.

https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/visit/northern-ireland/pattersons-spade-mill

Yes I know the difference. My point is when I question the saying they call a spade a spade and ask what else you would call a spade, people say shovel. And they are not the same thing. So what else would you call a spade? It just seems a really stupid saying to me.

Well at least that makes some sort of logical sense. I did Google it but I didn't instantly find an answer that made sense to me so my ADHD said sorry not today.

Yes, but better than a book that just explains sayings — a book that has sayings that mean the same thing as they say, so the sayings would make sense as they are. You would probably also need explanations, but those wouldn’t be the main thing.

Sorry about the ramble, I was always better at theorising than doing.

Thanks, but I'm not sure what You mean by an autistic sayings book?

Do you mean a book that explains common sayings? The internet has those explanations?

You’re good at this. Have you thought of writing an autistic sayings book?