like a bump on a log

1. Unmoving, inactive, stupidly silent. For example, Harry just sat there like a bump on a log while everyone else joined in the fun. This simile presumably alludes to the immobility of such a protuberance. [Colloquial; mid-1800s]

Example Sentences

Sheryl Lozano, 54, was a program participant—in part, she said, because “I didn't want to lay in bed all day like a bump on a log. I wanted to get out and do something.”

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“Baker sat there in the Oval Office like a bump on a log,” he recalled.

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He never offers a suggestion for an outing and just sits like a bump on a log if we do anything as a group.

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“I didn’t think that he would embrace the process there. I thought he would just sit there like a bump on a log till the time was up. . . . When I saw him . . . he was dramatically changed.”

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But in 1981, with his two young daughters getting a bit older, he found himself watching “ABC’s Wide World of Sports” and feeling, he said, like a bump on a log — that he never fully realized his athletic potential.

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