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no great shakes

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Nothing out of the ordinary, mediocre, as in I'm afraid the new pitcher is no great shakes, or What I did with this decorating project was no great shakes. This term possibly alludes to the shaking of dice, which most often yields a mediocre result, but there is no evidence to support this theory. [Early 1800s]

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The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary Copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
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