an earful

an earful

A lengthy reprimand or lecture. I got an earful from my mom once she heard about my speeding ticket. I gave that kid an earful after he dented my car.
See also: earful
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms.

*an earful

Fig. a great amount of discussion, criticism, gossip, or complaint. (*Typically: get ~; have ~; give someone ~.) She was really mad about something, and I sure got an earful. Sue was standing around the corner while Jim and Mary were arguing and got an earful.
See also: earful
McGraw-Hill Dictionary of American Idioms and Phrasal Verbs.
See also:
  • earful
  • give (one) an earful
  • give someone an earful
  • get an earful
  • call (one) to task
  • bring (one) to task
  • six feet under
  • a working over
  • a box on the ear
  • be as mad as a hornet
References in periodicals archive
Priyanka Chopra heard an earful from a frustrated Pakistani fan who called her a hypocrite for seemingly advocating for peace ...
At a BeautyCon appearance on Saturday, of all places, Priyanka Chopra got an earful from an audience member.
Queen's Park......4 Elgin City...............1 David Galt lit up Hampden with a five-minute hat-trick but not before copping an earful from manager Mark Roberts for gifting Elgin their opener.
You went back for more, giving the cyclist an earful. You could have killed him."
Hotel guests getting an earful from striking workers
* Boy, Ray Buckley sure got an earful last month from folks in the Keene area who haven't forgotten the not-so-invisible hand that tipped the scales in favor of Hill.
With the Hawkeyes playing lackluster in the first half, Marano gave Bolick an earful as he walked from the dugout back to the bench.
I, for one, am tempted to unleash an earful with the choicest rude words.
Given the Finnegans Wake--meets--Four Loko complexities of Trecartin's masterful screenplays, be prepared for an earful.
Probably because BP is worth so much to the Scottish economy, not even SNP apparatchiks are prepared to give him an earful. That's what Rupert Soames, boss of power company Aggreko reckons happens to bosses who make their antiindependence views known.
"If we've gotten an earful about anything, we've gotten an earful about preferences."
I know they have a mission to deliver pizzas or burgers to fat wasters before it goes cold and they get an earful of abuse from a disgruntled customer, but their antics on the roads are unbelievable.
JACK WILSHERE might get an earful from Roy Hodgson about smoking - if Arsene Wenger asks the England boss to reinforce the point.
I'll bet you get an earful showing that dead bunny rabbit!
When underwater microphones recorded the breakup of a floating chunk of ice drifting away from Antarctica, scientists got an earful. The 2008 collapse released as much sound energy as would have been generated by more than 200 supertankers over the same period, Robert Dziak of Oregon State University and colleagues report June 18 in Oceanography.