BOMBEROS IN SPANISH PHRASEOLOGY

 

The expression tener ideas de bombero is defined in Seco’s dictionary, under bombero, as ideas “propias de persona torpe y sin ingenio.” María Moliner, under idea, gives “idea descabellada.” The DRAE likewise explains the idiom as “descabellado o absurdo.”

Writers have used the phrase with this same sense. Eduardo Mendoza includes it in La verdad del caso Savolta (1973): “Nicolás tiene ideas de bombero.” Torcuato Luca de Tena writes “Tienes ideas de bombero” in Los renglones torcidos de Dios (1979).

The meaning is reasonably clear on its own; it sharpens even further when we look for an idiomatic English equivalent. Options include harebrained, half-baked, madcap, screwball, or crackpot idea or opinion. One might also choose horseback idea/opinion, which Paul Green et al. define in Paul Green’s Wordbook (1998, US) as “a hurried judgement or opinion, guesswork.”

Those of us who work between two languages can often refine translations or equivalents by searching the parallel idiom in the other tongue, as is the case with today’s entry.