"look what the cat's dragged in" meaning in English

See look what the cat's dragged in in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Phrase

Audio: En-au-look what the cat's dragged in.ogg [Australia] Forms: look what the cat's dragged in ! [canonical]
Etymology: From the habit of domestic cats of bringing home the remains of killed animals. Head templates: {{head|en|phrase|head=look what the cat's dragged in!}} look what the cat's dragged in!
  1. (idiomatic) Used as an ironic acknowledgement of someone's arrival, especially to imply that they are unwelcome or disagreeable in some way. Tags: idiomatic Synonyms: look what the cat dragged in, look what the cat drug in, look who the cat dragged in

Alternative forms

Download JSON data for look what the cat's dragged in meaning in English (2.9kB)

{
  "etymology_text": "From the habit of domestic cats of bringing home the remains of killed animals.",
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "look what the cat's dragged in !",
      "tags": [
        "canonical"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "phrase",
        "head": "look what the cat's dragged in!"
      },
      "expansion": "look what the cat's dragged in!",
      "name": "head"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "phrase",
  "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 entries with language name categories using raw markup",
          "parents": [
            "Entries with language name categories using raw markup",
            "Entry maintenance"
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          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English predicates",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English terms with non-redundant non-automated sortkeys",
          "parents": [
            "Terms with non-redundant non-automated sortkeys",
            "Entry maintenance"
          ],
          "source": "w"
        }
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "ref": "2009, Monica Ali, In The Kitchen, Random House, page 526",
          "text": "Still facing the mirror, he drawled, ‘Look what the cat's dragged in. Where have you been?’ Gabriel rubbed his chin.",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2012, Cory Doctorow, Charles Stross, The Rapture of the Nerds, Tor Books, page 283",
          "text": "“Well, look what the cat drug in, Sam,” says a familiar voice, which comes, of course, from everywhere and nowhere.",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2012, David Park, The Big Snow, A&C Black",
          "text": "‘Well, well, look what the cat's dragged in,’ Gracey said as he moved the thick stump of his neck from side to side and rubbed the back of it with the great towel of his hand. ‘Nice to see you grace us with your presence, Swift. […]’",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "Used as an ironic acknowledgement of someone's arrival, especially to imply that they are unwelcome or disagreeable in some way."
      ],
      "id": "en-look_what_the_cat's_dragged_in-en-phrase-NPFv0aK7",
      "links": [
        [
          "ironic",
          "ironic#English"
        ],
        [
          "arrival",
          "arrival#English"
        ],
        [
          "unwelcome",
          "unwelcome#English"
        ],
        [
          "disagreeable",
          "disagreeable#English"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(idiomatic) Used as an ironic acknowledgement of someone's arrival, especially to imply that they are unwelcome or disagreeable in some way."
      ],
      "synonyms": [
        {
          "word": "look what the cat dragged in"
        },
        {
          "word": "look what the cat drug in"
        },
        {
          "word": "look who the cat dragged in"
        }
      ],
      "tags": [
        "idiomatic"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "audio": "En-au-look what the cat's dragged in.ogg",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/9/90/En-au-look_what_the_cat%27s_dragged_in.ogg/En-au-look_what_the_cat%27s_dragged_in.ogg.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/90/En-au-look_what_the_cat%27s_dragged_in.ogg",
      "tags": [
        "Australia"
      ],
      "text": "Audio (AU)"
    }
  ],
  "word": "look what the cat's dragged in"
}
{
  "etymology_text": "From the habit of domestic cats of bringing home the remains of killed animals.",
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "look what the cat's dragged in !",
      "tags": [
        "canonical"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "phrase",
        "head": "look what the cat's dragged in!"
      },
      "expansion": "look what the cat's dragged in!",
      "name": "head"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "phrase",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        "English entries with incorrect language header",
        "English entries with language name categories using raw markup",
        "English idioms",
        "English lemmas",
        "English multiword terms",
        "English phrases",
        "English predicates",
        "English terms with audio links",
        "English terms with non-redundant non-automated sortkeys",
        "English terms with quotations"
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "ref": "2009, Monica Ali, In The Kitchen, Random House, page 526",
          "text": "Still facing the mirror, he drawled, ‘Look what the cat's dragged in. Where have you been?’ Gabriel rubbed his chin.",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2012, Cory Doctorow, Charles Stross, The Rapture of the Nerds, Tor Books, page 283",
          "text": "“Well, look what the cat drug in, Sam,” says a familiar voice, which comes, of course, from everywhere and nowhere.",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2012, David Park, The Big Snow, A&C Black",
          "text": "‘Well, well, look what the cat's dragged in,’ Gracey said as he moved the thick stump of his neck from side to side and rubbed the back of it with the great towel of his hand. ‘Nice to see you grace us with your presence, Swift. […]’",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "Used as an ironic acknowledgement of someone's arrival, especially to imply that they are unwelcome or disagreeable in some way."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "ironic",
          "ironic#English"
        ],
        [
          "arrival",
          "arrival#English"
        ],
        [
          "unwelcome",
          "unwelcome#English"
        ],
        [
          "disagreeable",
          "disagreeable#English"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(idiomatic) Used as an ironic acknowledgement of someone's arrival, especially to imply that they are unwelcome or disagreeable in some way."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "idiomatic"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "audio": "En-au-look what the cat's dragged in.ogg",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/9/90/En-au-look_what_the_cat%27s_dragged_in.ogg/En-au-look_what_the_cat%27s_dragged_in.ogg.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/90/En-au-look_what_the_cat%27s_dragged_in.ogg",
      "tags": [
        "Australia"
      ],
      "text": "Audio (AU)"
    }
  ],
  "synonyms": [
    {
      "word": "look what the cat dragged in"
    },
    {
      "word": "look what the cat drug in"
    },
    {
      "word": "look who the cat dragged in"
    }
  ],
  "word": "look what the cat's dragged in"
}

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-05-06 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-05-02 using wiktextract (f4fd8c9 and c9440ce). 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.