21-letter words containing t, o, e, s

to mix your metaphors — If you mix your metaphors, you use two conflicting metaphors. People do this accidentally, or sometimes deliberately as a joke.
to move the goalposts — If you accuse someone of moving the goalposts, you mean that they have changed the rules in a situation or an activity, in order to gain an advantage for themselves and to make things difficult for other people.
to play second fiddle — If you play second fiddle to someone, your position is less important than theirs in something that you are doing together.
to pull someone's leg — If you are pulling someone's leg, you are teasing them by telling them something shocking or worrying as a joke.
to put one over on sb — If someone puts one over on you, they make you do or believe something by telling you things that are not true.
to put the wind up sb — If something or someone puts the wind up you, they frighten or worry you.
to put/set sb to work — If you put someone to work or set them to work, you give them a job or task to do.
to rear its ugly head — If something unpleasant rears its head or rears its ugly head, it becomes visible or noticeable.
to risk life and limb — If someone risks life and limb, they do something very dangerous that may cause them to die or be seriously injured.
to rub shoulders with — If you rub shoulders with famous people, you meet them and talk to them. You can also say that you rub elbows with someone, especially in American English.
to set foot somewhere — If you say that someone sets foot in a place, you mean that they enter it or reach it, and you are emphasizing the significance of their action. If you say that someone never sets foot in a place, you are emphasizing that they never go there.
to shoot from the hip — If you say that someone shoots from the hip or fires from the hip, you mean that they react to situations or give their opinion very quickly, without stopping to think.
to sink without trace — If you say that someone or something sinks without trace or sinks without a trace, you mean that they stop existing or stop being successful very suddenly and completely.
topgallant forecastle — a partial weather deck on top of a forecastle superstructure; forecastle deck.
total recoverable gas — Total recoverable gas is the amount of gas which is still left in the ground in gas fields that have already been worked.
toussaint l'ouverture — François Dominique [frahn-swa dawmee-neek] /frɑ̃ˈswa dɔmiˈnik/ (Show IPA), 1743–1803, Haitian patriot and leader of the Haitian Revolution slave rebellion.
trades union congress — The Trades Union Congress in Britain is the same as the TUC.
transformational rule — Linguistics. a rule of transformational grammar that relates two phrase markers in the course of a derivation from the deep to the surface syntactic representation of a sentence, as by reordering, inserting, or deleting elements; a rule that converts deep structures into surface structures.
transport segregation — Transport segregation is when particles from a mixture separate because the mixture vibrates while it is being moved.
traveling salesperson — a representative of a business firm who travels in an assigned territory soliciting orders for a company's services.
triple superphosphate — superphosphate (def 2).
triple-superphosphate — Also called acid phosphate. a mixture of calcium acid phosphate and calcium sulfate prepared by treating phosphate rock with sulfuric acid: used chiefly as a fertilizer.
truth or consequences — a game in which each contestant is asked a question and upon failure to answer or give a correct answer receives a penalty imposed by the leader or the group.
tumor necrosis factor — a protein, produced in humans and other animals, that is destructive to cells showing abnormally rapid growth: identical with cachectin. Abbreviation: TNF.
turn up one's nose at — to sneer at; scorn
twist the lion's tail — a large, usually tawny-yellow cat, Panthera leo, native to Africa and southern Asia, having a tufted tail and, in the male, a large mane.
two-point perspective — a mathematical system for representing three-dimensional objects and space on a two-dimensional surface by means of intersecting lines that are drawn vertically and horizontally and that radiate from one point (one-point perspective) two points (two-point perspective) or several points on a horizon line as perceived by a viewer imagined in an arbitrarily fixed position.
uk overseas territory — any of the territories that are governed by the UK but lie outside the British Isles; many were formerly British crown colonies: includes Bermuda, Falkland Islands, and Montserrat
ulm's modula-2 system — (language) A Modula-2 compiler, library and tools by Andreas Borchert <[email protected]>. The compiler is derived from the ETHZ compiler for the Lilith system. Version 2.2.1 conforms to PIM3. It requires gas version 1.36 (to be found in the same directory). Commercial use requires a licence. It runs on Sun-3, Nixdorf Targon/31, Concurrent 3200 Series.
ulster unionist party — a Northern Irish political party advocating the maintenance of union with the UK
ultraviolet astronomy — the branch of astronomy that deals with celestial objects emitting electromagnetic radiation in the ultraviolet range.
under one's own steam — If you do something under your own steam, you do it without any help from anyone else.
uniform business rate — a local tax in the UK paid by businesses, based on a local valuation of their premises and a rate fixed by central government that applies throughout the country
universal disk format — (storage, standard) (UDF) A CD-ROM file system standard that is required for DVD ROMs. UDF is the OSTA's replacement for the ISO 9660 file system used on CD-ROMs, but will be mostly used on DVD. DVD multimedia disks use UDF to contain MPEG audio and video streams. To read DVDs you need a DVD drive, the kernel driver for the drive, MPEG video support, and a UDF driver. DVDs containing both UDF filesystems and ISO 9660 filesystems can be read without UDF support. UDF can also be used by CD-R and CD-RW recorders in packet writing mode.
university of arizona — (body, education) The University was founded in 1885 as a Land Grant institution with a three-fold mission of teaching, research and public service. Today, the University is one of the top 20 research universities in the nation, with a student enrollment of more than 35,000, a faculty and staff of 12,500, and a 345-acre campus. Address: Tucson, Arizona, USA.
university of iceland — (body, education) The Home of Fjolnir.
up to the elbows with — busily occupied with; deeply immersed in
vacation bible school — a religious school conducted by some churches during the summer for students on vacation.
ventriloquist's dummy — a puppet which is operated by a ventriloquist and made to appear to talk
venus's flower basket — a glass sponge of the genus Euplectella, inhabiting deep waters off the Philippines and Japan, having a cylindrical skeleton formed of an intricate latticework of siliceous spicules.
virtual memory system — (operating system) (VMS) DEC's proprietary operating system originally produced for its VAX minicomputer. VMS V1 was released in August 1978. VMS was renamed "OpenVMS" around version 5.5. The first version of VMS on DEC Alpha was known as OpenVMS for AXP V1.0, and the correct way to refer to the operating system now is OpenVMS for VAX or OpenVMS for Alpha. The renaming also signified the fact that the X/Open consortium had certified OpenVMS as having a high support for POSIX standards. VMS is one of the most secure operating systems on the market (making it popular in financial institutions). It currently (October 1997) has the best clustering capability (both number and distance) and is very scalable with binaries portable from small desktop workstations up to huge mainframes. Many Unix fans generously concede that VMS would probably be the hacker's favourite commercial OS if Unix didn't exist; though true, this makes VMS fans furious.
vladivostok agreement — a preliminary arms control accord concluded by Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev and U.S. President Gerald Ford in Vladivostok, U.S.S.R., in December 1974.
voice-stress analyzer — a machine purported to detect stress in a human voice and to ascertain a person's truthfulness.
volunteers of america — a religious reform and relief organization, similar to the Salvation Army, founded in New York City in 1896 by Ballington Booth, son of William Booth, the founder of the Salvation Army. Abbreviation: VOA.
warm silence software — A small company run by(?) Robin Watts, producing software for the Acorn Archimedes.
water of constitution — water present in a molecule that cannot be removed without disrupting the molecule.
weinberg-salam theory — electroweak theory.
west lothian question — the apparent inconsistency that members of parliament who represent Scottish constituencies are eligible to vote at Westminster on matters that relate only to England, whereas members of parliament from English constituencies are not eligible to vote on Scottish matters
wet collodion process — a photographic process, in common use in the mid-19th century, employing a glass photographic plate coated with iodized collodion and dipped in a silver nitrate solution immediately before use.
what price something? — what are the chances of something happening now?

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