no spring chicken
nounEtymology From the description of a young person as a spring chicken.
- They expect me to carry this box myself while climbing the stairs to the seventh floor? I don't know about that — I'm no spring chicken.
- You know the world. You are no spring chicken.1908, Upton Sinclair, chapter 5, in The Money Changers:
2 more examples
- A real candidate arose to challenge dapper Robert Rice ("Buncombe Bob") Reynolds, aging coxcomb of the Senate. The candidate, no spring chicken himself: tall, lean Clyde Roark Hoey (pronounced Hooey), 65, one of the most popular Governors the state ever had.1943 May 10, “The Pot Boils”, in Time:
- He doubtless hoped for a sympathetic ruling from President Reagan, at 70 no spring chicken himself.1981 November 23, “Newest Sub, Oldest Sailor”, in Time:
2
Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see no, spring, chicken.
- Related terms
- long in the tooth, of a certain age, oldster, old person, over the hill