Word.ws English Dictionary

like a blue-arsed fly

like a blue-arsed fly adjective: to be frantic, harried or restless.

Adjective

like a blue-arsed fly

  1. (simile) To be frantic, harried or restless
    • He was running around like a blue-arsed fly.2008, Patrick Burke, An Illiterate Genius, page 277

Forms of like a blue-arsed fly

alternative formlike a blue-assed fly

Origin of like a blue-arsed fly

Refers to the frenetic flight of a bluebottle.

Questions about like a blue-arsed fly

What does like a blue-arsed fly mean?
Like a blue-arsed fly means to be frantic, harried or restless.
What part of speech is like a blue-arsed fly?
Like a blue-arsed fly is an adjective.

Words near like a blue-arsed fly in the dictionary

  1. like a bear with a sore head
  2. like a bee in clover
  3. like a big dog
  4. like a bitch
  5. like a bitch on heat
  6. like a blue-arsed fly
  7. like a boss
  8. like a bowl in a china shop
  9. like a bug to a zapper
  10. like a bull at a gate
  11. like a bull in a china shop

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: like a blue-arsed fly (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-au-like a blue-arsed fly.ogg.

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