shaggy-dog story

shaggy-dog Story

a kind of funny story that relies for its humor on its length and its sudden ridiculous ending. Don't let John tell a shaggy-dog story. It'll go on for hours. Mary didn't get the point of Fred's shaggy-dog story.

shaggy-dog story

A long drawn-out anecdote with an absurd or anticlimactic ending. For example, At first he had us laughing wildly at his shaggy-dog stories, but after the third or fourth we found them tiresome . The term alludes to a well-known series of such stories, which involved a talking dog. [c. 1940]

Common Names:

Name	Pronounced	Usage
Alta	-	Various
Asha (1)	-	Indian, Hindi, Marathi, Kannada, Malayalam
Harrington	['hæriŋtən]
Basajaun	-	Basque
Alexandra	[.ælig'za:ndrə]
Lei (1)	-	Hawaiian