The Best (and Worst) College Metaphors

The following metaphors are some of the best (and worst) examples taken from college entrance exams and essay tests.

He spoke with the wisdom that can only come from experience, like a guy who went blind because he looked at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it and now goes around the country speaking at high schools about the dangers of looking at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it.

She caught your eye like one of those pointy hook latches that used to dangle from screen doors and would fly up whenever you banged the door open again.

The little boat gently drifted across the pond in much the same way a bowling ball wouldn’t.

McBride fell 12 stories, hitting the pavement like a Hefty bag filled with vegetable soup.

From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie, surreal quality, like when you’re on vacation in another city and “Wheel of Fortune” comes on at 7 p.m. instead of 7:30.

Her auburn locks glistened in the rain like nose hair after a sneeze.

Her eyes were like two brown circles with big black dots in the center.

Bob was as perplexed as a hacker who means to access T:flw.quid55328.com\aaakk/ch@ung but gets T:\flw.quidaaakk/ch@ung by mistake.

Her vocabulary was as bad as, like, whatever.

He was as tall as a six-foot-three-inch tree.

The hailstones leaped from the pavement like maggots when they’re fried in hot grease.

Her date was pleasant enough, but she knew that if her life was a movie this guy would be buried in the credits as something like “Second Tall Man.”

Long separated by cruel fate, the star-crossed lovers raced across the grassy field toward each other like two freight trains, one having left Cleveland at 6:36 p.m. traveling at 55 mph, the other from Topeka at 4:19 p.m. at a speed of 35 mph.

The politician was gone but unnoticed, like the period after the Dr. on a Dr Pepper can.

They lived in a typical suburban neighborhood with picket fences that resembled Nancy Kerrigan’s teeth.

John and Mary had never met. They were like two hummingbirds who also had never met.

The thunder was ominous-sounding, much like the noise that a thin sheet of metal makes when being shaken backstage during the storm scene in a play.

His thoughts tumbled in his head, making and breaking alliances like underpants in a dryer without Cling Free.

The red brick wall was the color of a brick-red Crayola crayon.

Her face was a perfect oval, like a circle that had its two other sides gently compressed by a Thigh Master.

Even in his last years, Granddad had a mind like a steel trap, only one that had been left out so long it had rusted shut.

Shots rang out, as shots are wont to do.

The plan was simple, like my brother Phil. But unlike Phil, this plan just might work.

The young fighter had a hungry look, the kind you get from not eating for a while.

Oh, Jason, take me!” she panted, her breasts heaving like a student on dollar beer night.

He was as lame as a duck. Not the metaphorical lame duck either, but a real duck that was actually lame. Maybe from stepping on a land mine or something.

He fell for her like his heart was a mob informant and she was the East River.

The door had been forced, like the dialogue during the interview portion of “Jeopardy!”

She had a deep, throaty, genuine laugh, like that sound a dog makes just before it throws up.

It came down the stairs looking very much like something no one had ever seen before.

Her artistic sense was exquisitely refined, like someone who can tell butter from “I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter.”

The knife was as sharp as the tone used by Rep. Doug Collins (R-GA) in his opening statements to Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) in the House Judiciary Committee hearings on the impeachment of President Donald John Trump.

The ballerina rose en pointe and gracefully extended one slender leg behind her, like a dog at a fire hydrant.

The revelation that his marriage of 30 years had disintegrated because of his wife’s infidelity came as a rude shock, like a surcharge at a formerly surcharge-free ATM.

The dandelion swayed in the gentle breeze like an oscillating electric fan set on medium.

It was an American tradition, like fathers chasing their kids around with power tools.

He was deeply in love. When she spoke, he imagined he heard bells, as though she were a garbage truck backing up.

She was as easy as the “TV Guide” crossword.

Her eyes were like limpid pools in which no one had ever added any pH balancing solution.

She grew on him like she was a colony of E. coli and he was room-temperature beef.

She walked into my office like a centipede with 98 missing legs.

Her voice had that tense, grating quality, like a first-generation thermal paper fax machine that needed a band tightened.

It hurt the way your tongue hurts after you accidentally staple it to the wall.