teakettle

a storm in a teakettle

A disproportionate reaction of anger, concern, or displeasure over some minor or trivial matter. (A less common variant of "a tempest in a teacup/teapot.") If you ask me, these protests are nothing but a storm in a teakettle that's been stoked by a media campaign of misinformation. I really think you're making a storm in a teakettle over this. It's just a tiny scratch on the car!
See also: storm, teakettle

a tempest in a teakettle

A disproportionate reaction of anger, concern, or displeasure over some minor or trivial matter. (A less common variant of "a tempest in a teacup/teapot.") If you ask me, these protests are nothing but a tempest in a teakettle that's been stoked by a media campaign of misinformation. I really think you're making a tempest in a teakettle over this. It's just a tiny scratch on the car!
See also: teakettle, tempest

ass over teakettle

rude slang Flipped upside down; head over heels. My poor sister just went ass over teakettle on the ice out there! I hope she isn't hurt! Finding out Bill is selling the company has turned my whole world ass over teakettle—I can't believe I'm going to have to find a new job after 25 years!
See also: ass, over, teakettle
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms.
See also:
  • a storm in a teacup
  • a storm in a teakettle
  • a storm in a teapot
  • a tempest in a teacup
  • a tempest in a teakettle
  • a tempest in a teapot
  • be the matter
  • be the matter (with someone or something)
  • bristle
  • bristle at
References in periodicals archive
When water is heated in a whistling teakettle, the water boils and steam is released.
This DVD documents The Teakettle Experiment, a 10-year study into the effects of fire and thinning on the Sierra National Forest in California.
The new 1 1/2-quart Chantal Tea Ball is a rounded 18/10 stainless steel teakettle with a polished or satin finish
Santoprene is used to overmold the handles of flatware from Libbey Glass (Toledo, Ohio) and the grip of a whimsical teakettle from Michael Graves & Associates (Princeton, N.J.), meeting both performance and aesthetic design criteria.
That's as hot as water in a teakettle gets before boiling.
Lording over her petite charges with one arm akimbo and the other holding a cigarette aloft, looking like a very pissed-off teakettle, she barks instructions with a mechanical weariness that all but says, What's the point?
People sometimes remember a bird's song better by making up words for what the bird "says." For example, a Carolina wren often sings something that sounds like teakettle, teakettle, tea.
The water that fills a teakettle miles downstream in a city apartment is a measure of all that has gone on upstream: blizzard and drought, logging and road building, care and neglect.
Marvin landed an extra role in Henry Hathaway's USS Teakettle, and found his role expanded when Hathaway took a liking to him.
The remaining forward force of expanding gas in the meantime is splitting the bell of his trombone, peeling it back on itself, and knocking Paolo butt over teakettle off his raised seat platform.
Gus, is trying to make tea, but he has no coin to put into the meter that provides gas to heat the teakettle. The men argue absurdly about whether one says "Light the gas" or "Light the kettle." Their silly quarrels seem to mask a growing tension and anxiety about the "job." Ben examines and prepares his gun.
In the preface to his collection of narrative sketches, Bunte Steine ( Colored Stones, 1853), he states that a boiling teakettle interests him as much as a volcano, that in even the most trivial phenomena, provided one knows how to look at them, the universal harmony of nature may be recognized.
From stationery to cookware, kitchen design to home furnishings, it is a garden-fresh approach to color that is as successful as a textile as it is a lacquered teakettle. Rooms will glow with its subtle color, and in fashion it is a color that complements many complexions.
I hear the turquoise teakettle shrilling, but am unable to tell in what
Chantal's Classic enamel-on-steel teakettle features an exclusive two-tone harmonica, a 1.8 qt.