Does anyone here use the term "getting wrapped around the axle" to describe getting

[CTyankee]

deeply effed up over something.

I think I heard it from a Navy guy I dated. He worked at the Pentagon. All these years later I usually use it as in "we don't need to get all wrapped around the axle about ____"

Since I don't know anything about navies, I hope someone here does and will enlighten me.

[dem4decades]

1. You'd think he would have been worried about something wrapped around the propeller.

[CTyankee]

3. what he called the "screw."

I get it.

[LuckyCharms]

2. Yes, but I was not in the Navy.

It's been a common regional term used around here for as long as I can remember.

New York State here.

[SharonClark]

4. Never heard that phrase so I googled it.

There’s a lot of information from various sources on it’s origin and usage.

[Kali]

5. heck, I have had it happen

fencing wire getting wrapped around an axel or a drive line

[CTyankee]

7. that sounds downright painful...

[Kali]

11. at least those were going slow on dirt roads

the scariest was a blown out trailer tire that stayed in a circle and got wrapped around a horse trailer axle on the interstate. that puts the brakes on movement pretty fast, or a fire if you don't stop!

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

6. All the time. I assume it means something like getting tangled up.

Google gave me this: https://www.grammarphobia.com/blog/2020/06/wrapped-around-the-axle.html#:~:text=The%20earliest%20example%20we've,16%2C%201867).

[CTyankee]

8. that's a fun read. Thanks!

[ShazzieB]

19. Great read, thanks!

Glad to learn about the existence of this site, too. My inner English major thanks you doubly for that.

[marble falls]

9. In the USN its 'wrapped around the screw'. The screw being the thing at the end of the shaft ...

... that make the boat go.

Submariners get to say "boat".

[dawg day]

10. I thought that came from dancer Isidore Duncan..

who had a flamboyant long silk scarf on, was standing theatrically up in a speeding car, and the scarf got wound around the car axel, and strangled her.

[gibraltar72]

12. Used as a term in auto racing

However any shaft connecting gears is also an axle. Typically in auto racing a blown tire could wrap around the axle.

[CTyankee]

14. Now THAT sounds like a perfect description.

[Laelth]

13. Deep South (Georgia) here. No. Never heard that one. n/t

-Laelth

[Midnight Writer]

15. Common phrase here in Central Illinois. "Don't let it get wrapped around your axle"

Don't get so affected by something that it stops you moving forward.

[CTyankee]

16. My Navy guy was a Texan as was I. So go figure.

[zipplewrath]

17. Engineering

In my line of work it was more an expression about getting so focused on small problem that you miss the larger picture.

[CTyankee]

20. I can see that...it works well in that context.

[sarge43]

18. As I understand, it comes from the days when tire chains were used on cars/trucks in winter.

They were horrors to secure on the tires and if not done correctly would detach and "wrapped around the axle".

A major cluster coitus.

[electric_blue68]

21. That happened to me and I saved myself in time 😳

Every several years or so I remember or something reminds me.

This was about 40 yes ago. I was working in the art department of a small magazine publisher. I can't remember what the final purpose of the machine I was working with - but it had about a foot long turning
cylander part (not a waxing machine) housed inside a long boxy base.

I was wearing a short shimmery longish scarf. (DUH!!!)

Guess what got caught!? 😧

LUCKILY... (like in a movie) as I was pulled closer, and closer, I was trying to find the toggle off switch - I was Successful! OMG 🥰


Welp, right now I'm slogging through something that's challenging to me in particular but this is a good "in perspective" check! 👍


Oooo, I think I remember bc It had a hooded section - it might have been reducing/enlarging machine with a auto lift/lower belt to move the "shelf" you placed the image you wanted to eventually make a tracing of. 🤔