hit the fan
verbEtymology
Uncertain. Possibly derived from an old joke: A man in a crowded bar needed to defecate but couldn't find a bathroom, so he went upstairs and used a hole in the floor. Returning, he found everyone had gone except the bartender, who was cowering behind the bar. When the man asked what had happened, the bartender replied, 'Where were you when the shit hit the fan?' Other possible sources include American/Canadian military slang or agricultural manure spreaders.
Definitions
To have a dramatic, usually negative, effect.
- They were just clowning around, when suddenly it all hit the fan.
- Then the shit really hit the fan.
The neighborhood
Vish — recursive loop
No curated loop yet for hit the fan. Loops are being traced one word at a time while the ingestion pipeline matures.
sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA