huff and puff

huff and puff

1. To struggle or exert oneself physically. We huffed and puffed, but we did finally manage to get the couch up the steps.
2. To breathe very heavily or laboriously. Running to catch the bus has left me huffing and puffing. You really should quit smoking—look at how you're huffing and puffing after a single flight of stairs!
3. To make an exaggerated show of one's anger, often by making empty threats. A: "Are we in trouble?" B: "No, just let him huff and puff until he's done—he'll forget all about it by tomorrow."
See also: and, huff, puff
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms.

huff and puff

Fig. to breathe very hard; to pant as one exerts effort. John came up the stairs huffing and puffing. He huffed and puffed and finally got up the steep hill.
See also: and, huff, puff
McGraw-Hill Dictionary of American Idioms and Phrasal Verbs.

huff and puff

Make noisy, empty threats; bluster. For example, You can huff and puff about storm warnings all you like, but we'll believe it when we see it . This expression uses two words of 16th-century origin, huff, meaning "to emit puffs of breath in anger," and puff, meaning "to blow in short gusts," and figuratively, "to inflate" or "make conceited." They were combined in the familiar nursery tale, "The Three Little Pigs," where the wicked wolf warns, "I'll huff and I'll puff and I'll blow your house down"; rhyme has helped these idioms survive.
See also: and, huff, puff
The American Heritage® Dictionary of Idioms by Christine Ammer.

huff and puff

1 breathe heavily with exhaustion. 2 express your annoyance in an obvious or threatening way.
See also: and, huff, puff
Farlex Partner Idioms Dictionary

ˌhuff and ˈpuff


1 breathe heavily while making a great physical effort: They huffed and puffed as they carried the sofa upstairs.
2 make it obvious that you are annoyed about something without doing anything to change the situation: After much huffing and puffing, he agreed to help.
See also: and, huff, puff
Farlex Partner Idioms Dictionary
See also:
  • wash (one's) hands of (someone or something)
  • wash hands of
  • wash one's hands of
  • wash your hands of
  • wash your hands of somebody/something
  • wash your hands of something/someone
  • for (one's) (own) sake
  • for sake
  • keep (someone or something) in sight
  • keep sight of
References in periodicals archive
It will be huff and puff, blame somebody else and not do the real work of governing.
Double duff; Letters.
In normal families, you huff and puff and moan that life is unfair.
BEST WRISTLOCK
At the late stage of the water huff and puff, the production performance, the water cut rise rapidly and the develop performance become worse after several water injection cycles.
Experimental investigation of single well huff and puff in vuggy porous media
Also trying a mile and threequarters for the first time, Palazzo Bianco was strong at the finish to beat Huff And Puff by a length and a half.
Palazzo to land prize
And Halliday said: "There was a lot of huff and puff and effort but we lacked quality.
That was worst loss of my Korea; HOCKEY
vvStar performance Maiden winner Huff And Puff has the potential to be very decent, but he appears to be a long-term project AMANDA PERRETT unleashed promising Huff And Puff to win what could turn out to be a useful 1m4f maiden, as runner-up Eshtyaaq holds a Derby entry.
Huff And Puff blows his rivals away; KEMPTON WEDNESDAY
Another is our Huff and Puff Zone which is red and has bats and balls.
In the zone! IN ASSOCIATION WITH information discovery news room innovation development
Last term, Friends of Highcliffe helped to pay for a shed, which was built between the two playgrounds to store the huff and puff play equipment and make it easier to give out and collect the equipment at playtime.
Exciting equipment for school playtime; In association with: REDCAR & CLEVELAND COLLEGE
If they all huff and puff at the same time they might even blow Tony out the door.
If all of us blow Tony might go
We huff and puff a bit and finish up with four strikers on.
YourShout - Pitiful Blues are all out of ideas - SOUND familiar? Blues play 4-5-1 with the only striker
Codikow's hard work in her effort to huff and puff up the mighty Tinseltown ladder, I was amazed to see history, rewritten before my very eyes in Anne Stockwell's article concerning the founding of POWER UP.
Power down
If skiing-specific muscles are out of shape when the season begins, you won't just huff and puff down the slope; you'll face great potential for a number of serious injuries.
Getting the most out of this ski season
This was typical of the Sunderland performance we have been used to under Mick McCarthy ( plenty of huff and puff but a team devoid of creativity, quality or skill to break down an opposition defence.
The Journal Jury
They huff and puff about methodology in determining Savonarola's sincerity and his belief in his prophetic inspiration, and their analysis of the "confessions" is not only distracting but already somewhat out of date, since they seem not to have had available the complete edition of the trial record by I.
La politique de l'experience: Savonarole, Guicciardini et le republicanisme florentin