Definition
Said of a disappointing or mundane event occurring straight after an exciting, magnificent, or triumphal event.
Origins
From the proverb "After the Lord Mayor's show comes the dust-cart" (or "donkey-cart", or "shit-cart"). Bringing up the rear of the Lord Mayor's Show is a team to clean the manure of the pageant's horses.
In Context
- "as is usual on all such occasions, after gaiety comes squalor; or, as we observe in respect to the annual pageant of the City of London that "after the Lord Mayor's Show comes a,—donkey-cart,"
- "The All Whites came into this match hotfoot from their stunning victory over Castres last Tuesday which took them into the semi-final of the prototype European Cup. ... For a while it looked as if it might be a case of after the Lord Mayor's show as Swansea struggled with one of their dozy moods, against Treorchy."
- ""After the Lord Mayor's Show." Freddy looked up from reading Punch. "What is, old fruit?" "The excitement's gone. Back to dull monotony.""
See Also
- anticlimax
- hangover