'Nice Knowing You' Idiom Meaning, Origin & History | Superduper English Idioms

0:00 - How to Say, “Nice knowing you…”
0:20 - Examples of “Nice knowing you…”
1:09 - Meaning of “Nice knowing you…”
1:53 - Origin of “Nice knowing you…”
2:34 - More Examples of “Nice knowing you…”
3:19 - Conclusion

“Nice knowing you…”

When someone uses the slang, “Nice knowing you…”, they jokingly mean that something bad is about to happen to you and they’ll never see you again.

“Nice knowing you! I wish I could be there when your parents see what you did to the house,” you might tell a friend after a wild party.

Maybe your friend says she’s going to a shady, suspicious, dangerous part of town to meet a buyer for her gold jewelry, “You’re not going with anyone? Nice knowing you…”

“You crashed dad’s car?! Nice knowing you…” you might say to your teenage brother after he borrowed your dad’s prized possession without permission.

As you can see, “nice knowing you,” is used when someone jokes, jests, quips, teases that as a result of something you did; something dreadful, terrible, awful will happen to you.

It sounds like, “nice knowing you,” simply means the same thing as, “nice to meet you,” or “glad to know ya,” but you most often won’t hear it being used in this way today, though historically it was.

It seems that, “nice knowing you,” as a sarcastic, ironic comment indicating that you’ll never see the person ever again was popularized by the famous American comedian, Groucho Marx.

When he divorced his wife of 21 years in 1942, he sarkily said to her, “Well, it’s been nice knowing you; if you’re ever in the neighbourhood again, drop in.”

“Ready to die? It’s been nice knowing you!” a teenager playing video games might say to a friend right before a versus match.

Perhaps you’re reading an article on the decline of the United States of America’s power, “Ta-ta America, it was nice knowing you.”

“It was nice knowing you all, see you at the finish line!” an arrogant, cocky, pompous competitor might say before the start of a race.

So, the next time you’d like to jokingly, jeeringly, mockingly tell others that “their time is up”, you’ll never see them again, you can say, “Nice knowing you.”

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