Sample Sentences for
grindstone
grouped by contextual meaning
(editor-reviewed)

grindstone as in:  sharpen on a grindstone

Show 3 more with this contextual meaning
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    She sharpened the knife on a grindstone.
    grindstone = a  disk shaped stone used to sharpen or polish
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    My jack-knife here needs the grindstone.  (source)
    grindstone = a stone shaped like a disk that spins and is used to sharpen, grind, or polish
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    The grindstone, pestle and mortar were too heavy to take; in any case my daughter-in-law would be providing these.  (source)
    grindstone = a large stone used to grind, sharpen or polish
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Show 10 more with 2 word variations
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    There's a gaudy big grindstone down at the mill...  (source)
    grindstone = a large stone shaped like a disk that spins and is used to grind grain
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    The barn had stalls on the main floor for the work horses, tie-ups on the main floor for the cows, a sheepfold down below for the sheep, a pigpen down below for Wilbur, and it was full of all sorts of things that you find in barns: ladders, grindstones, pitch forks, monkey wrenches, scythes, lawn mowers, snow shovels, ax handles, milk pails, water buckets, empty grain sacks, and rusty rat traps.†  (source)
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    After grinding a number of dull blades,—of whom it was remarkable that their fathers, when influential, were always going to help him to preferment, but always forgot to do it when the blades had left the Grindstone,—he had wearied of that poor work and had come to London.  (source)
    Grindstone = a revolving stone shaped like a disk that is used to sharpen, grind, or polish
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    Near by him men sat bending over whirling grindstones, putting the finishing touches to the steel knives of the reaper; picking them out of a basket with the right hand, pressing first one side and then the other against the stone and finally dropping them with the left hand into another basket.†  (source)
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    ...come, turn this grindstone.  (source)
    grindstone = a large stone shaped like a disk that spins and is used to grind, sharpen or polish
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    Horns cracked out in the darkening stillness; grindstones screeched.†  (source)
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    Time to put our noses to the grindstone.†  (source)
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    I would have happily chopped off the heads of a barrel full of eels to escape another afternoon trapped with men whose voices droned on and on and on like rumbling, dusty grindstones.†  (source)
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    Timothy said that the sand in the sea water acted like a grindstone on the sharp edges of the coral.†  (source)
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    Though the wheels were moving, Roran could tell they were disengaged from the complex arrangement of gears hidden inside the buildings, for he did not hear the rumble of the grindstones turning in their places.†  (source)
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grindstone as in:  back to the grindstone

•
I need to get back to the grindstone.
back to the grindstone = hard work
Show 3 more with this contextual meaning
  • •
    Keep your nose to the grindstone.
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    'So you've got your exams coming up, haven't you? They'll be keeping your noses so hard to that grindstone they'll be rubbed raw,' said Fred with satisfaction.  (source)
    grindstone = hard work (figuratively referring to working hard with a large stone used to grind, sharpen, or polish)
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    No, now that he had arrived, he must keep his nose to the grindstone.†  (source)
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    "Keeps your nose to the grindstone," Tyler said, grinning.†  (source)
    editor's notes: A grindstone was a revolving disk-shaped stone used to grind grain as when grinding wheat into flour, or to sharpen or polish as when sharpening a knife. This expression is easy to remember if you picture someone working to sharpen a knife blade by holding it against a rotating stone while leaning over it.
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    Kept his nose to the grindstone and sold one bottle of snake oil too many.†  (source)
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