"cool as a trout" George Macdonald Fraser in Flashman in the Great Game

"'Tasteful' does not begin to describe it." Dave Barry in The Ottawa Citizen June 19, 2004 [from my cherished compilation of hidden insults; the specific reference was competitors in the human-powered aircraft "Flugtag" competition in Miami whose contraption intentionally resembled a giant cow giving birth - I am not making that up]

"the unwelcome mat…" Expression used in an editorial in Globe and Mail July 28, 1999

"’What about a train ride?’ I’d asked the [Intourist] clerk. ‘Is the Trans-Siberian Railroad any fun?’ She stared at me. ‘It will be long remembered,’ she said." P.J. O’Rourke Eat the Rich

"I’ve had a perfectly wonderful evening. But this wasn’t it." Widely attributed to Groucho Marx but in 1962 he denied saying it in real life on leaving a party; he may have used it in a comedy routine but it almost certainly did not originate with him

"That’s the key to comedy; allowing yourself to look stupid." Megan Mullally in Ladies’ Home Journal

"I believe in an open mind, but not so open that your brains fall out." Arthur Hays Sulzberger

"poor as Job’s turkey" A writer whose name I failed to record in Chronicles magazine May 1994