Idiom
hurry up and wait
Meaning
To hurry to complete a task or arrive at a destination by a specified time, only for nothing to happen, due to other requirements that have yet to be satisfied.
Meaning adapted from Wiktionary, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Examples
“We always hurry up and wait at the airport.”
“The manager told us to finish the report by noon, but now we just hurry up and wait for his approval.”
“Military life is often defined by the frustrating routine of having to hurry up and wait for orders that never seem to arrive on time.”
Examples
simple
“We always hurry up and wait at the airport.”
contextual
“The manager told us to finish the report by noon, but now we just hurry up and wait for his approval.”
complex
“Military life is often defined by the frustrating routine of having to hurry up and wait for orders that never seem to arrive on time.”
Origin
From hurry up + wait. The phrase is a compound of the imperatives for haste and for patience.
Key words
Related idioms
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