nobody home

1. The person being discussed is mentally impaired and so cannot understand, as in When the woman did not answer, he concluded it was a case of nobody home . Both usages transfer the absence of someone in a dwelling to absent-mindedness or mental deficiency, and are thought to have been invented by cartoonist and journalist Thomas Aloysius Dorgan (“TAD”) around 1900. He often embellished his column with such punning amplifications as “Nobody home but the telephone and that's in the hands of the receiver,” or “Nobody home but the oyster and that's in the stew.”

2. No one is paying attention, as in She threw the ball right past him, yelling “Nobody home!”

Example Sentences

Nobody home, Jerry chirped; house shut up, and old man skipped to town.

From Project Gutenberg

One night early in October he had come home from the games parlor and, finding nobody home, had gone immediately to sleep.

From Project Gutenberg

It is that scabby baby on the third floor, fallen out of bed again, with nobody home to pick him up.

From Project Gutenberg

Take the ordinary small suburban house, with nobody home and everything supposed to be tightly locked up.

From Project Gutenberg

"Nobody home at The Dreamerie—" He took her face in his calloused hands, drew her to him.

From Project Gutenberg

Related Words

• deranged
• erratic
• irrational
• unhinged
• unsound
• unstable