Meaning of put a pin in | Babel Free

Definitions

1. To discredit or ridicule; to deflate someone or something that is pompous or overly esteemed.
2. To make something certain; to nail down.
3. To postpone; to stop focusing or working on (something) until it can be finished at a later time.
4. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see put, pin, in.

Examples

“Another has heard the Thomas orchestra play the overture, or remembers how well the orchestra under Mancinelli came out with the fine touches of the music, and this one puts a pin in the orchestra. The music critic, that microcosm of the tonal world, has heard all these things, and he puts a pin in every one of them and goes home and looks in the glass to find the halo due him for having performed a virtuous act .”

“On the other hand, the lecture which puts a pin in professional egos and provokes opposition, may well turn out to carry the seed to future professional growth.”

“Let me put a pin in a few hierarchical myths: ○ Doctors are smarter/better/more important than nurses: nope, they just have more knowledge and experience in a particular area than you do.”

“Every time he seemed to have a notion of what, why and when, whenever he seemed to be able to put a pin in that ever elusive cause, that ghost that was to blame, whoever it belonged to it would suddenly and without warning disappear.”

“As Boyce wrote: I could sense that there was some expectation that [the Opening Ceremony] would put a pin in the national identity, that we would have to decide — is Britain rural or urban, ancient or modern, riot or clean-up, roundhead or cavalier, multi-cultural or divided?”

““Remember that gay unsub in Santa Monica who killed boys on their twenty-first birthdays? He brought them home, sat them up at his dinner table, and served the corpses birthday cake.” “Okay, let's put a pin in that for a minute. We don't know why he actually cooked a Cajun dinner, but let's assume he did.”

“As long as I'm on this subject, let me put a pin in the narrative for another few lines so I can close out the story of my undergraduate career, which by now had been dragging on for way longer than necessary.”

“Investigations of crimes continued 24/7, but in cases where no lives hung in the balance and national security was not an issue, the Bureau cranked down the intensity of its work on Saturday and Sunday. Nathan could justify putting a pin in the matter of Jane Hawk until Monday.”

“A woman makes a wax man, puts a pin in its chest; and the man dies.”

“They're going to put a pin in my femur.”

“Lay down the binding on the left, and put a pin in the quilt to mark where it ends.”

“Every time we get a tip, we put a pin in this map.”

CEFR level