The Italian expression pieno come un uovo has never convinced me. Surely, to describe how stuffed you are after an antipasto, pasta, smoked scamorza cheese, chicory sauteed in olive oil, garlic and red pepper, tiramisu and espresso, there must be something more appropriate than “I’m as full as an egg.” An egg? Since when is an egg the fullest thing imaginable?
Here is a tentative list of things fuller than an egg.
Sono pieno come…
- Napoli
- un’elefantessa incinta (A pregnant elephant)
- il pranzo di natale (Christmas lunch)
- Calcutta
- un politico di bugie (a politician is of lies)
- Kishke
- il GRA alle 18.00 (the ring road at 6pm)
Add your own!
Geniale!
per me, la domanda sarebbe piutosto, da quanti giorni non avevi mangiato per ordinare un pasto cosi!
Hi Bar,
How are you? I stalked you through Marion’s blog, by the way. My big question, though, is whether that phrase predates Shakespeare: “Thy head is as full of quarrels as an egg is full of meat, and yet thy head hath been beaten as addle as an egg for quarreling” (Mercutio.) What a slam!
Hope you are well.
Margaret
Margaret! Out of nowhere you drop a bomb from your seemingly limitless arsenal of culture.
I have no idea how to date the italian phrase. According to the wikipedia in dialette asculà you can also say Sò piene ‘nda nu bettacce!