nobody home

there's nobody home

Said of someone whom one thinks is dimwitted or mentally impaired. I've been trying to get information from him for half an hour, but there's nobody home as far as I can tell. She's sweet and very attractive, but there's nobody home when you try to discuss any serious topic.
See also: home, nobody
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms.

nobody home

1. No one is paying attention, as in She threw the ball right past him, yelling "Nobody home!"
2. The person being discussed is mentally impaired and so cannot understand, as in When the woman did not answer, he concluded it was a case of nobody home. Both usages transfer the absence of someone in a dwelling to absent-mindedness or mental deficiency, and are thought to have been invented by cartoonist and journalist Thomas Aloysius Dorgan ("TAD") around 1900. He often embellished his column with such punning amplifications as "Nobody home but the telephone and that's in the hands of the receiver," or "Nobody home but the oyster and that's in the stew."
See also: home, nobody
The American Heritage® Dictionary of Idioms by Christine Ammer.
See also:
  • There’s nobody home
  • there's nobody home
  • there's no one home
  • mouth breather
  • mouth-breather
  • partially sighted
  • sighted
  • (one) is not playing with a full deck
  • have nothing between the/(one's) ears
  • I like pie
References in periodicals archive
Lights on, nobody home. If you come back, "Oh, there I am again.'' All of a sudden, you're looking at yourself, like, "Where am I now?
The Zen of Bill; Bill Murray insists on giving it straight
'A little girl and her dog?' 'No, it's a puppet!' The lights are on but there's nobody home.
SO WHAT HAVE THE ECHO'S CABBIE COLUMNISTS BEEN TALKING ABOUT THIS WEEK?
"In the summer, when there was nobody home to babysit me, I would get up with my dad at two in the morning.
Multi- nimensional: michael Cuddyer's ability to do different things on the baseball field and away from the game has made him a better player
"When she got to the house, it seemed there was nobody home because it was all locked up," he said.
Man found dead inside daughter's QC home
After an energetic rendition of "Hey, Ho, Nobody Home," she clapped her hands.
Bits of the Bard
The second half resumed with the band hidden behind the bricks, Waters eventually appearing front of stage and then, for Nobody Home, in a mini living room set that cleverly descended out of the wall.
Rock
This can take a period of time before causing a fire when there is nobody home to detect and extinguish it.
Import of 127-volt appliances to end mid-2012
"Never Been a Bad Girl" is a cheeky, cabaret-style jazz number (the video for which features New York City's Lower East Side queer scene star Murray Hill),"Carolina" is a bouncy bluegrass cut, "Failed Waitress/Failed Astronaut" is languid Dixieland jazz and "Nobody Home to Sing the Blues," is, well, the blues.
Uncommon Roots: New Orleans-inspired sounds, beyond the bayou
The lights are on but there's nobody home: If you're not using a room, switch off all electrical appliances, including lights, when you leave.
Bus shelters suffer from power problems
Luckily there was nobody home when the fire started.
House blaze started by bath candle
Singing "Hey ho, nobody home, meat nor drink nor money have I none ..." we filed into the room repeating the round over and over, until every girl stood in place behind one of the grey benches.
Singing at Camp Yenis Hante
NOBODY HOME: One of four huge film studios built at the Valleywood site in Llanilid near Bridgend PICTURE: Patrick Olner
Welcome to Valleywood, the biggest movie flop of all time; Ready to roll but the stage remains a huge empty space
But by then six of Minot's seven radio stations were owned by Clear Channel, and when the police called those stations there was nobody home.
Blocking the big mouths: the media reform movement comes of age
There had been a dream start for Newport when in the second minute Nathan Williams collected a Jamie Davies kick and found nobody home in the Aberavon defence as he sent Craig Hill in for a try that James Dixon converted.
Wizard start turns into a nightmare
The house was clearly being lived in, but a knock on the door revealed that there was nobody home, or at least nobody willing to admit they were home.
The firewood guy