take a shellacking

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Be soundly beaten or defeated, as in Our team took quite a shellacking last night. Why being coated with shellac should suggest defeat is not clear. [Slang; c. 1930]

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The rainy weather could not ________ my elated spirits on my graduation day.

affect

effect

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Words nearby take a shellacking

take a picture, take a poke at, take a powder, take a rain check, take as gospel, take a shellacking, take a shine to, take aside, take a spill, take a stand, take at face value

How to use take a shellacking in a sentence

Yet this, in the end, is a book from which one emerges sad, gloomy, disenchanted, at least if we agree to take it seriously.
Houellebecq’s Incendiary Novel Imagines France With a Muslim President|Pierre Assouline|January 9, 2015|DAILY BEAST
And now, similarly, former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee: "Bend over and take it like a prisoner!"
Huckabee 2016: Bend Over and Take It Like a Prisoner!|Olivia Nuzzi|January 8, 2015|DAILY BEAST
ROME — What does it take for a Hollywood A-lister to get a private audience with Pope Francis?
Pope Francis Has the Pleasure of Meeting Angelina Jolie for a Few Seconds|Barbie Latza Nadeau|January 8, 2015|DAILY BEAST
Although Huckabee's condescending tone - like that of an elementary school history teacher - makes it difficult to take seriously.
Huckabee 2016: Bend Over and Take It Like a Prisoner!|Olivia Nuzzi|January 8, 2015|DAILY BEAST

Clickbait title notwithstanding, Bend Over and Take It Like a Prisoner!
Huckabee 2016: Bend Over and Take It Like a Prisoner!|Olivia Nuzzi|January 8, 2015|DAILY BEAST
I take the Extream Bells, and set down the six Changes on them thus.
Tintinnalogia, or, the Art of Ringing|Richard Duckworth and Fabian Stedman
Now-a-days it is the bankrupt who flouts, and his too confiding creditors who are jeered and laughed at.
Glances at Europe|Horace Greeley
Wycliffe translates the Vulgate: “And it as a modir onourid schal meete hym, and as a womman fro virgynyte schal take him.”
Solomon and Solomonic Literature|Moncure Daniel Conway
But it was necessary to take Silan, which the rebels hastened to strengthen, closely followed up by the Spaniards.
The Philippine Islands|John Foreman
And this summer it seemed to her that she never would be able to take proper care of her nestful of children.
The Tale of Grandfather Mole|Arthur Scott Bailey