draw a blank
verbEtymology Probably from the idea of drawing of a blank (losing) ticket in an old-fashioned lottery.
1
Idiomatic To be unable to recall a required piece of information.
- I should know that person's name, but I'm drawing a blank.
2
Idiomatic To fail; not to find anything; to produce no successful response.
- "Oh," she replied, "when I came to think of it, I saw, that you were right. I thought, 'twas quite likely it [the lottery ticket] would draw a blank.[…]"1856, Lucius Manlius Sargent, Dealings with the Dead, volume 2, page 472:
- When she brainstormed about what else she would do, where else she would go, her mind drew a blank.2022, Ling Ma, “Office Hours”, in Bliss Montage, New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, →ISBN:
- Related terms
- brain cramp, come up empty, draw blank, on the tip of one's tongue, thinko