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  • Hi this is Tutor Nick P and this is Idioms 286. The idiom today could be said

  • actually three different ways. It could be said as no skin off my nose. No skin

  • off my teeth or no skin off my back. Okay. Let's look at the note here. All three of

  • these phrases basically mean that a certain issue or matter would not affect

  • one adversely. So it won't affect you in a negative way or in a bad way. In a way

  • you are saying you are neutral and don't really care because it won't hurt you. So

  • that's kind of what you're saying when you say this phrase. With any of these

  • three words at the end. All right. Let's continue. The first thing to note is that

  • the phrase no skin off my nose tends to be more used in the UK. So yeah. As an

  • American I don't remember hearing this one too much, but yeah and I've seen

  • online that's what they mostly say. So this one's mostly a UK phrase. No skin

  • off my teeth is more common in the US and this one actually might seem strange

  • to people in the UK. And it's also even a little strange in the u.s. because of

  • course your teeth have no skin. So how can you... how could something be no skin off

  • my teeth. Now. Of course your teeth are attached to your gums which go up but I

  • don't even know if we really consider the gums as skin either. So but anyway

  • it's it's still a common phrase. It's and it has basically the same meaning it's

  • no skin off my nose, and no skin off my back.

  • All right. And no skin off my back could be used in both either in the UK or in the

  • US. All right. Let's continue. Some believe no skin off my nose may have come from

  • the world of boxing. It seems to have appeared in the early 1900s

  • and the idea alludes to a boxers vulnerability of being hit

  • in the nose. Yeah. If you're a boxer, they hit you in the face a lot. So the nose is the

  • thing that's pointing out more. So I don't know will they really take you

  • some skin off. I don't know sometimes they might bleed , but that's the idea.

  • Okay. No skin off my back is more clear. It is believed to come from the practice

  • of disciplining sailors by flogging them. So basically whipping them. If one is

  • whipped it will literally take off the skin on one's back. We've probably all

  • seen movies where somebody's being whipped. And then you, you see that it

  • does or at least it's supposed to take the skin off ... you see the the red scars

  • or the red marks of them being whipped. Okay. If you are not the person being

  • whipped, well at that point it was no skin off your back because you know, well I'm

  • not being whip, so it's not hurting me. I guess that's the idea behind it. All

  • right. Good. And. Yeah. No skin off one's teeth may have been a mix of the phrase

  • by the skin of one's teeth which , which actually now that has a different

  • meaning. That means barely or hardly like you,

  • you, you just barely got by. By the skin of your teeth. Only by a very little

  • amount. And the skin off one's nose. Somehow they might have joined together

  • and , the skin off one's teeth. That's what a

  • lot of people think. All right and we give three examples of how it's used

  • even though with all these examples you could really trade any one of those

  • endings. So here's number one. I don't care who wins. Either way it is no skin

  • off my nose or you could have says no skin off my teeth. No skin off my back.

  • All right and number two here. Whether they find him innocent or guilty ,

  • it's no skin off my teeth. And the third one here. Whether that company goes

  • bankrupt or not, it's no skin off my back. So you're saying well it's not going to

  • hurt me. It's not my problem. Okay. Anyway, I hope you got it. I hope you

  • found it informative. Thank you for your time. Bye-bye.

Hi this is Tutor Nick P and this is Idioms 286. The idiom today could be said

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