21-letter words containing w, e, t, s
- throw someone a curve — a continuously bending line, without angles.
- to blow sth wide open — to expose something
- 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 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 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.
- 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.
- under one's own steam — If you do something under your own steam, you do it without any help from anyone else.
- up to the elbows with — busily occupied with; deeply immersed in
- 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.
- warm silence software — A small company run by(?) Robin Watts, producing software for the Acorn Archimedes.
- watenstedt-salzgitter — former name of Salzgitter.
- water of constitution — water present in a molecule that cannot be removed without disrupting the molecule.
- water-vascular system — a system of closed, fluid-filled tubes and ducts of echinoderms used in clinging, locomotion, feeding, and respiration.
- 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
- west university place — a city in SE Texas.
- 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?
- what the future holds — If you wonder what the future holds, you wonder what will happen in the future.
- when the dust settles — If you say that something will happen when the dust settles, you mean that a situation will be clearer after it has calmed down. If you let the dust settle before doing something, you let a situation calm down before you try to do anything else.
- whistling in the dark — If you say that someone is whistling in the dark, you mean that they are trying to remain brave and convince themselves that the situation is not as bad as it seems.
- white-crowned sparrow — a North American sparrow, Zonotrichia leucophrys, having black and white stripes on the head.
- wilson's storm petrel — a small petrel, Oceanites oceanicus, that breeds in the Southern Hemisphere but ranges into the North Atlantic and Pacific oceans.
- with one's bare hands — If someone does something with their bare hands, they do it without using any weapons or tools.
- with sb's compliments — If you say that you are giving someone something with your compliments, you are saying in a polite and fairly formal way that you are giving it to them, especially as a gift or a favour.
- word association test — a technique for determining a subject's associative pattern by providing a verbal stimulus to which a verbal response is required.
- word-association test — a psychological test in which the person being tested responds to a given word with the first word (or the first word in a specified category, such as an antonym) brought to mind
- workers' compensation — a government-sponsored insurance system, funded by contributions from employers, for compensating employees for injury or occupational disease suffered in connection with their employment
- worth someone's while — worth someone's time, consideration, etc.; profitable in some way
- writ of habeas corpus — law: petition for hearing
- yellow-fever mosquito — a mosquito, Aedes aegypti, that transmits yellow fever and dengue.