wake-up call
a telephone call that wakes a person from sleep
an event that alerts people to a danger or difficulty
Words Nearby wake-up call
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
How to use wake-up call in a sentence
However, we have just had a necessary wake-up call that all is not as secure as we believed.
A Gift to the Jihadis: The Unseen Airport Security Threat | Clive Irving | December 27, 2014 | THE DAILY BEASTFor these people the disaster over the Mojave Desert is a sobering wake-up call.
Virgin Galactic’s Flight Path to Disaster: A Clash of High Risk and Hyperbole | Clive Irving | November 1, 2014 | THE DAILY BEASTIf you want to predict trends in America, whether in politics or products, World Cup mania should serve as a wake-up call.
Ann Coulter Doesn’t Get the Real Reasons Behind America’s World Cup Mania | Kristen Soltis Anderson | July 1, 2014 | THE DAILY BEASTA new CDC report serves as a wake-up call for the importance of childhood vaccines.
New CDC Report Says Vaccines Prevented 322 Million Diseases In Last 20 Years | Brandy Zadrozny | April 24, 2014 | THE DAILY BEAST“This study should be a wake-up call to parents and educators everywhere,” says Greenberg.
Other Idioms and Phrases with wake-up call
A portentous event, report, or situation that brings an issue to immediate attention. For example, The rise in unemployment has given a wake-up call to state governments, or The success of the online subscription is a wake-up call to publishers. This metaphoric term originated in the second half of the 1900s for a telephone call arranged in advance to awaken a sleeper, especially in a hotel. Its figurative use dates from about 1990.
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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