Idiom
borrowed time
Meaning
A period of time whose precise duration is not known but which can be expected to be quite limited, and at the end of which one's situation, benefits, or opportunities will be entirely terminated.
Meaning adapted from Wiktionary, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Examples
“The old car is on borrowed time.”
“The company has been losing money for months, so the manager knows the project is on borrowed time.”
“After the structural failure was discovered in the historic bridge, engineers warned the city that the entire span was operating on borrowed time.”
Examples
simple
“The old car is on borrowed time.”
contextual
“The company has been losing money for months, so the manager knows the project is on borrowed time.”
complex
“After the structural failure was discovered in the historic bridge, engineers warned the city that the entire span was operating on borrowed time.”
Key words
Related idioms
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