no great shakes

Idioms and Phrases

Nothing out of the ordinary, mediocre, as in I'm afraid the new pitcher is no great shakes , or What I did with this decorating project was no great shakes . This term possibly alludes to the shaking of dice, which most often yields a mediocre result, but there is no evidence to support this theory. [Early 1800s]

Related Words

• common
• conventional
• dull
• generic
• humble
• mediocre
• normal
• plain
• simple
• unremarkable
• workaday