"catch flies" meaning in All languages combined

See catch flies on Wiktionary

Verb [English]

Audio: en-au-catch flies.ogg [Australia] Forms: catches flies [present, singular, third-person], catching flies [participle, present], caught flies [participle, past], caught flies [past]
Head templates: {{en-verb|catch<,,caught> flies}} catch flies (third-person singular simple present catches flies, present participle catching flies, simple past and past participle caught flies)
  1. (idiomatic) To have one's mouth wide open for a prolonged period. Tags: idiomatic
    Sense id: en-catch_flies-en-verb-HwWiiDiq
  2. (theater, informal) Of an actor: to distract the audience by moving or gesturing when the focus should be elsewhere. Tags: informal Categories (topical): Theater
    Sense id: en-catch_flies-en-verb-XAD9MiZF Topics: entertainment, lifestyle, theater
  3. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see catch, fly. Related terms: flytrap, you can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar
    Sense id: en-catch_flies-en-verb-nhu7hRk7 Categories (other): English entries with incorrect language header Disambiguation of English entries with incorrect language header: 27 31 42

Inflected forms

Download JSON data for catch flies meaning in All languages combined (2.4kB)

{
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "catches flies",
      "tags": [
        "present",
        "singular",
        "third-person"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "catching flies",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "present"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "caught flies",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "past"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "caught flies",
      "tags": [
        "past"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "catch<,,caught> flies"
      },
      "expansion": "catch flies (third-person singular simple present catches flies, present participle catching flies, simple past and past participle caught flies)",
      "name": "en-verb"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "verb",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [],
      "examples": [
        {
          "text": "You'd better close your mouth; are you trying to catch flies?"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "To have one's mouth wide open for a prolonged period."
      ],
      "id": "en-catch_flies-en-verb-HwWiiDiq",
      "links": [
        [
          "mouth",
          "mouth"
        ],
        [
          "wide open",
          "wide open"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(idiomatic) To have one's mouth wide open for a prolonged period."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "idiomatic"
      ]
    },
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "kind": "topical",
          "langcode": "en",
          "name": "Theater",
          "orig": "en:Theater",
          "parents": [
            "Art",
            "Entertainment",
            "Culture",
            "Society",
            "All topics",
            "Fundamental"
          ],
          "source": "w"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "Of an actor: to distract the audience by moving or gesturing when the focus should be elsewhere."
      ],
      "id": "en-catch_flies-en-verb-XAD9MiZF",
      "links": [
        [
          "theater",
          "theater"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(theater, informal) Of an actor: to distract the audience by moving or gesturing when the focus should be elsewhere."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "informal"
      ],
      "topics": [
        "entertainment",
        "lifestyle",
        "theater"
      ]
    },
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "_dis": "27 31 42",
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
          "parents": [
            "Entries with incorrect language header",
            "Entry maintenance"
          ],
          "source": "w+disamb"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see catch, fly."
      ],
      "id": "en-catch_flies-en-verb-nhu7hRk7",
      "links": [
        [
          "catch",
          "catch#English"
        ],
        [
          "fly",
          "fly#English"
        ]
      ],
      "related": [
        {
          "_dis1": "7 14 79",
          "word": "flytrap"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "7 14 79",
          "word": "you can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar"
        }
      ]
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "audio": "en-au-catch flies.ogg",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/9/9c/En-au-catch_flies.ogg/En-au-catch_flies.ogg.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9c/En-au-catch_flies.ogg",
      "tags": [
        "Australia"
      ],
      "text": "Audio (AU)"
    }
  ],
  "word": "catch flies"
}
{
  "categories": [
    "English entries with incorrect language header",
    "English lemmas",
    "English multiword terms",
    "English terms with audio links",
    "English verbs"
  ],
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "catches flies",
      "tags": [
        "present",
        "singular",
        "third-person"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "catching flies",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "present"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "caught flies",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "past"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "caught flies",
      "tags": [
        "past"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "catch<,,caught> flies"
      },
      "expansion": "catch flies (third-person singular simple present catches flies, present participle catching flies, simple past and past participle caught flies)",
      "name": "en-verb"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "verb",
  "related": [
    {
      "word": "flytrap"
    },
    {
      "word": "you can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar"
    }
  ],
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        "English idioms"
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "text": "You'd better close your mouth; are you trying to catch flies?"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "To have one's mouth wide open for a prolonged period."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "mouth",
          "mouth"
        ],
        [
          "wide open",
          "wide open"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(idiomatic) To have one's mouth wide open for a prolonged period."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "idiomatic"
      ]
    },
    {
      "categories": [
        "English informal terms",
        "en:Theater"
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "Of an actor: to distract the audience by moving or gesturing when the focus should be elsewhere."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "theater",
          "theater"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(theater, informal) Of an actor: to distract the audience by moving or gesturing when the focus should be elsewhere."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "informal"
      ],
      "topics": [
        "entertainment",
        "lifestyle",
        "theater"
      ]
    },
    {
      "glosses": [
        "Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see catch, fly."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "catch",
          "catch#English"
        ],
        [
          "fly",
          "fly#English"
        ]
      ]
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "audio": "en-au-catch flies.ogg",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/9/9c/En-au-catch_flies.ogg/En-au-catch_flies.ogg.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9c/En-au-catch_flies.ogg",
      "tags": [
        "Australia"
      ],
      "text": "Audio (AU)"
    }
  ],
  "word": "catch flies"
}

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable All languages combined dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-05-20 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-05-02 using wiktextract (1d5a7d1 and 304864d). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.