See dull as dishwater in All languages combined, or Wiktionary
{
"etymology_text": "Modified from dull as ditchwater (1700s) in the first half of the 1900s, perhaps through mispronunciation.",
"forms": [
{
"form": "dull as ditchwater",
"tags": [
"alternative"
]
}
],
"head_templates": [
{
"args": {
"1": "-"
},
"expansion": "dull as dishwater (not comparable)",
"name": "en-adj"
}
],
"lang": "English",
"lang_code": "en",
"pos": "adj",
"senses": [
{
"categories": [
{
"kind": "other",
"name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
"parents": [
"Entries with incorrect language header",
"Entry maintenance"
],
"source": "w"
},
{
"kind": "other",
"name": "English similes",
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"source": "w"
},
{
"kind": "other",
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"source": "w"
},
{
"kind": "other",
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},
{
"kind": "other",
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"parents": [],
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},
{
"kind": "other",
"name": "Terms with Finnish translations",
"parents": [],
"source": "w"
},
{
"kind": "other",
"name": "Terms with French translations",
"parents": [],
"source": "w"
},
{
"kind": "other",
"name": "Terms with Polish translations",
"parents": [],
"source": "w"
}
],
"examples": [
{
"ref": "1932, Delos W. Lovelace, King Kong, published 1965, page 6:",
"text": "‘My blessed Public must have a pretty girl’s face. Romance isn’t romance, adventure is as dull as dishwater...to my Public...unless, every so often, a face to sink a thousand ships, or is it saps? shows up.’",
"type": "quote"
}
],
"glosses": [
"Boring; ordinary; exceedingly dull."
],
"id": "en-dull_as_dishwater-en-adj-dTfSa7qb",
"links": [
[
"Boring",
"Boring"
],
[
"ordinary",
"ordinary"
],
[
"dull",
"dull"
]
],
"qualifier": "simile",
"raw_glosses": [
"(simile) Boring; ordinary; exceedingly dull."
],
"related": [
{
"word": "watch paint dry"
},
{
"word": "bored to tears"
}
],
"synonyms": [
{
"word": "boring as beans"
}
],
"tags": [
"not-comparable"
],
"translations": [
{
"code": "fi",
"lang": "Finnish",
"sense": "extremely boring",
"word": "tylsä kuin mikä"
},
{
"code": "fi",
"lang": "Finnish",
"sense": "extremely boring",
"word": "umpitylsä"
},
{
"code": "fr",
"lang": "French",
"sense": "extremely boring",
"word": "chiant comme la pluie"
},
{
"code": "pl",
"lang": "Polish",
"sense": "extremely boring",
"word": "nudny jak flaki z olejem"
}
]
}
],
"sounds": [
{
"audio": "En-au-dull as dishwater.ogg",
"mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/2/25/En-au-dull_as_dishwater.ogg/En-au-dull_as_dishwater.ogg.mp3",
"ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/25/En-au-dull_as_dishwater.ogg"
}
],
"word": "dull as dishwater"
}
{
"etymology_text": "Modified from dull as ditchwater (1700s) in the first half of the 1900s, perhaps through mispronunciation.",
"forms": [
{
"form": "dull as ditchwater",
"tags": [
"alternative"
]
}
],
"head_templates": [
{
"args": {
"1": "-"
},
"expansion": "dull as dishwater (not comparable)",
"name": "en-adj"
}
],
"lang": "English",
"lang_code": "en",
"pos": "adj",
"related": [
{
"word": "watch paint dry"
},
{
"word": "bored to tears"
}
],
"senses": [
{
"categories": [
"English adjectives",
"English entries with incorrect language header",
"English lemmas",
"English multiword terms",
"English similes",
"English terms with quotations",
"English uncomparable adjectives",
"Entries with translation boxes",
"Pages with 1 entry",
"Pages with entries",
"Terms with Finnish translations",
"Terms with French translations",
"Terms with Polish translations"
],
"examples": [
{
"ref": "1932, Delos W. Lovelace, King Kong, published 1965, page 6:",
"text": "‘My blessed Public must have a pretty girl’s face. Romance isn’t romance, adventure is as dull as dishwater...to my Public...unless, every so often, a face to sink a thousand ships, or is it saps? shows up.’",
"type": "quote"
}
],
"glosses": [
"Boring; ordinary; exceedingly dull."
],
"links": [
[
"Boring",
"Boring"
],
[
"ordinary",
"ordinary"
],
[
"dull",
"dull"
]
],
"qualifier": "simile",
"raw_glosses": [
"(simile) Boring; ordinary; exceedingly dull."
],
"synonyms": [
{
"word": "boring as beans"
}
],
"tags": [
"not-comparable"
]
}
],
"sounds": [
{
"audio": "En-au-dull as dishwater.ogg",
"mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/2/25/En-au-dull_as_dishwater.ogg/En-au-dull_as_dishwater.ogg.mp3",
"ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/25/En-au-dull_as_dishwater.ogg"
}
],
"translations": [
{
"code": "fi",
"lang": "Finnish",
"sense": "extremely boring",
"word": "tylsä kuin mikä"
},
{
"code": "fi",
"lang": "Finnish",
"sense": "extremely boring",
"word": "umpitylsä"
},
{
"code": "fr",
"lang": "French",
"sense": "extremely boring",
"word": "chiant comme la pluie"
},
{
"code": "pl",
"lang": "Polish",
"sense": "extremely boring",
"word": "nudny jak flaki z olejem"
}
],
"word": "dull as dishwater"
}
Download raw JSONL data for dull as dishwater meaning in English (2.1kB)
This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2025-03-01 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2025-02-21 using wiktextract (7c21d10 and f2e72e5). 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.