Marilyn's Photos - Jan 20 2026 - Catch the Falling Chainsaw
I saw this expression for the first time yesterday. It was in the business section of the Globe and Mail. And the sentence was: No one wants to catch the falling chainsaw that is the American dollar.
"Catching the falling chainsaw" is a metaphor used in financial news to describe the high-risk action of buying an asset (specifically the U.S. dollar in January 2026) that is rapidly declining in value.
Look how fast AI got to work to take the quote out of the Globe and Mail. It doesn’t want to do any real work, like telling me the actual origin of the phrase. It is willing to say it started as catching the falling knife and was recorded in literature in 1919, so a common phrase by then. Where it really originates is lost in the buzz about its relationship to the financial markets and buying and selling strategies. And then the Chainsaw Massacre movie.
While looking for the origin of the falling knife, I came upon a website with the origins for many common expressions/idioms. The site is HERE. Here’s one I found very amusing.
How did sirloin come about as a name for a cut of steak?
“Once upon a time, some king came upon an inn and was served beef not quite like he'd ever eaten before. He was also drinking alot with this meal and after a while (being a bit drunk) he pulled out his sword and knighted the meat "Sir Loin." And so in today's society a good sir loin steak is sold in the fine restaurants only fit for kings! Or...the word smiths feel that it really comes from the word 'surlonge' in French which means beef just above the loin.”
Wouldn’t it be wonderful to be so creative to make up an origin like this!
What might falling knife jokes look like? I found this one:
A technical analyst and a fundamental analyst are in the kitchen. The technician knocks a knife off the table, and it lands in the fundamental analyst's foot. The fundamental analyst asks, "Why didn't you catch the knife?" The technician replies, "You know technicians don't catch falling knives!" So the technical analyst replies, "Why didn't you move your foot?" The fundamental analyst answers, "I didn't think it could go that low".
This picture comes from a Toronto back lane, and I guess some gasoline had been spilled, making a little rainbow line against the asphalt.
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