Discussion Groups / English Usage / January 2007

geozec wrote:
   There was a line in an episode of
   "Two and a Half Men" which I just don't get language-wise.
   Charly says to a rather strange (tall) woman
   "My weirdness bar for chicks is pretty high but you
   are clearing it in street shoes".

   2 things I don't get:

   1- if you can clear a bar you don't run into it, right?
   So if she clears his bar then she's NOT weird if
   I understand this correctly. But then it
   doesn't make any sense.

   2- street shoes- are those shoes with no or
   little heel? If so then it would make only sense
   to me if he said something like "you crash into
   the bar even in (low) street shoes".

Think about the high jump event, where athletes go over
the bar; they "clear" 180 cm.
Note: this is a line concocted by script writers.

--                       ---------------------------------------------
Richard Maurer              To reply, remove half
Sunnyvale, California       of a homonym of a synonym for also.
----------------------------------------------------------------------

It means, "I don't consider women wierd unless they are really quite wierd,
but there's no doubt about it: you're seriously wierd."

It's a play on the figure of speech "setting the bar high" or "raising the
bar".

The image is from athletic competion: the bar used in the high jump (or
maybe the pole vault), where the object is to clear the bar by jumping over
it, and of course the bar keeps getting raised until only one of the
competitors can clear it.

"Raising the bar" is a common figure of speech for requiring or promoting a
higher standard of performance than previously. "Setting the bar high"
means requiring or expecting a high standard of performance.  

Thus, "My weirdness bar for chicks is pretty high" means "chicks have to be
really wierd for me to consider them wierd."

"Clearing my wiredness bar" means being considered wierd by me.

"Street shoes" means everyday shoes rather than some special kind of shoes,
such as athletic shoes (as in this case), or ballet shoes, heavy work
boots, house slippers, etc.

She's metaphorically clearing the bar without the advantage offered by
wearing the proper shoes for doing the high jump -- i.e., she doing it
easily, without having to try very hard.