Outrageously Funny Word Dictionary :: Striped knee

👉 Okay, let’s tackle this wonderfully baffling little linguistic oddity! Strap yourselves into your giggle seats.

What exactly is a "striped knee”? Seriously? When you stumble upon that phrase thrown around in certain circles (mostly of very specific and somewhat eccentric fashion aficionados or the unfortunately unlucky during a rather unfortunate fall involving striped argyle tights, frankly), it doesn’t actually refer to a literal knee sporting a topographical map of long, parallel lines. Instead, a "striped knee" is a wonderfully British euphemism for… you guessed it... the bruised and battered aftermath of a tumble! Essentially, it describes the very specific shade of purple, mauve, or even a tragically faded teal that appears on your shin when you’ve just executed an unplanned aerial manoeuvre. The stripes themselves are, of course, the individual bruises coalescing into a rather visually arresting (and slightly alarming) topographical sketch of your misfortune. It's not pretty, and it certainly doesn’t look good under boardroom lighting. Historically, this came about during the somewhat stuffy and terribly polite era of 1920s and 30s British sporting circles – think lawn bowls and perhaps a rather aggressive round of early rounds of early morning pheasant shooting. A gentleman with a “striped knee'’ wouldn't exactly announce his misfortune in full. Instead, he might delicately murmur something like, "Quite the little misstep, I seem to have… engaged with the green