to hell in a handbasket

to hell in a handbasket

A set phrase used to emphasize that something has gone wrong or awry. Typically used with the verb "go." I just got pulled into a meeting and assigned a huge project, so my day has really gone to hell in a handbasket. What a mess! This party really went to hell in a handbasket quickly!
See also: handbasket, hell
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms.
See also:
  • eggs is eggs
  • damn well
  • Fanny's your aunt
  • DYSWIDT?
  • (one's) best foot forward
  • best foot forward
  • a cold day in Hell
  • as one does
  • (Is) that everything?
  • buggy whip
References in periodicals archive
This is the point at which the quality of our roadsides goes to hell in a handbasket.
By GERRY LOUGHRANIf an older person ventures to suggest that things ain't what they used to be in dear old England, or that "we're all going to hell in a handbasket", as my elderly neighbour frequently declares, the reaction from the younger generation is invariably a patronising smile which says, "The doom-mongers are at it again".Well, this tiny island nation may be only a minuscule part of the world picture, but thinking Britons cannot escape the feeling that over recent years it has become a nastier place to live.
I think what insurers and officials need to do is to prepare folks psychologically for the change in approach and make sure that everyone understands that everyone is simply doing a better job of disclosing the ups and downs they were going through all along, not necessarily going to hell in a handbasket any more quickly they were before the new proposed rules take effect (if they take effect).
In the two weeks of the Olympics, hundreds have been slaughtered in Syria, 23 people died in floods in the Philippines, and the world economy continued to go to hell in a handbasket.
Is this yet another indication that the nation is off to hell in a handbasket? Well, actually, when it was originally produced in the 1700s it was alcoholic.
FITCHBURG - Despite the volatile stock market, the million homes in foreclosure proceedings and bailouts of financial institutions by Congress, the United States is not going to hell in a handbasket ...
"This country's gone to hell in a handbasket!" she'd say, no matter what provoked her.
"There will be more occasions when we think that the world is going to go to hell in a handbasket. But for the first time since last summer it is clear that the authorities are beginning to contain the financial sector crisis in the US."
Clad in a fur coat, Celia Cooney made off with the aforesaid money through a series of grocery store robberies that were reported by the likes of Ring Lardner and Walter Lippman, decried as the evidence that American youth were are going to hell in a handbasket, and admired as a working class hero.
"They thought they could control it and realised their recruiting efforts were going to go to hell in a handbasket if the truth about his death got out.
World leaders smiled and made assurances while the planet went to hell in a handbasket. They were all liars.
They went to Hell in a handbasket and there Was the ending for a xxxxxx xxxxxx.
MODERN ENVIRONMENTALISM, born of the radical movements of the 1960s, has often made recourse to science to press its claims that the world is going to hell in a handbasket. But this environmentalism has never really been a matter of objectively describing the world and calling for the particular social policies that the description implies.
The onus is on us that it's not just another book showing that we're going to hell in a handbasket."
Vermont can act as a model in another way as well, says Gerstmann: "The rest of the country will be able to see that Vermont is not going to hell in a handbasket. That can prove incredibly powerful in calming people's fears and paving the way for other states to follow."