Pair Sentences		Formulaic expressions frequency					Novel expressions frequency
		Whole Phrase	CW1	CW2	CW3	CW4	Whole Phrase	CW1	CW2	CW3	CW4
1	He’s got his head in the clouds	5	19453	732			0	726	19739
	He takes his pets in the car
2	The coast is clear	5	6363	20197			0	2748	6633
	The cook is angry
3	I’d like to give you a piece of my mind	5	11047	19223			0	3526	365
	The dog’s trying to give her a ride on the wagon
4	Just in the nick of time	33	1954	175915			0	6821	3013
	Almost to the bottom of the mountain
5	It’s like talking to a brick wall	0	52921	512	10785		0	1220	78	2012
	She tried jumping over the striped cat
6	I’ve got a bone to pick with you	15	1692	9833			0	12693	59623
	He’s got a picture of show of her
7	I’ll get back to you later	7	28340				0	5556
	He jumped up to her suddenly
8	He’s saving up for a rainy day	0	2008	326	83120		0	35937	22506	2012
	She’s looking down at her black cat
9	She’s got him eating out of her hand	0	3716	17476			0	3265	1973
	He sees her drinking from a bowl
10	That’s enough to drive a man to drink	0	6873	76912	3623		0	3905	6838	777
	It’s easy to teach a dog to swim
11	It seems like just yesterday	3	16317				0	7111
	He kisses the thin lady
12	Cat got your tongue?	1	2012	623			0	6993	6838
	Who’s following the dog?
13	None of your business	104	7050	30834			2	4463	56564
	Twice in the morning
14	A little of that goes a long way	0	91673	51013	125584		0	421	10739	3623
	A pitcher of this makes a fine drink
15	The sky’s the limit	31	2120	2760			0	5429	38553
	My van’s the place
16	You never had it so good	4	66606	139583			0	46812	2141
	I always feed them out back
17	On the other hand	3832	132285	17476			1	91673	13139
	For my little boy
18	My record speaks for itself	2	15279	2298			0	1697	10811
	Your uncle works with no one
19	I should be so lucky	3	3819				0	18948
	He might leave here quickly
20	Like beating your head against a wall	0	2480	19453	10785		0	1075	19739	119703
	Like stealing his car out of a lot
21	Through thick or thin	3	1074	1786			0	36549	11040
	From school or church
22	She took a sudden turn for the worse	1	4264	19980	8051		0	16187	21395	31285
	He made a certain move toward his left
23	Two wrongs don’t make a right	18	248300				0	8881	36549
	Those girls can’t be in school
24	The lesser of two evils	21	560	125			0	3385	23353
	The smaller of my problems
25	Don’t burn your bridges behind you	0	1801	1043			0	18949	707
	Don’t leave those cookies around him
26	No sooner said than done	0	1668	170304	50112		0	1061	33382	34304
	Lots cheaper old and used
27	There’s plenty more where that came from	0	3577	205073	46750		0	876	18839	233529
	It’s awfully nice when they give up
28	When it rains it pours	2	495	75			0	6873	3946
	As I drive, I sing
29	That takes the cake	28	13475	1368			0	1685	829
	This stops the leaks
30	Thank my lucky stars	3	75516	3819	4802		0	22049	3380
	Stop your stupid dogs
31	That’s water under the bridge	15	17760	2686			0	164	71618
	It’s cloudy over our house
32	What a small world	1	19437	68832			0	57877	19739
	Such a big car
33	Keep a stiff upper lip	7	520	552			0	4346	1505
	Grab a big dinner plate
34	Is there a doctor in the house?	7	11584	71618			0	7470	13404
	Was that a letter from his girl?
35	Haven’t I met you someplace before?	0	912	74879			0	95075	39479
	Couldn’t she give us something better?
36	Nothing ventured, nothing gained.	2	29632	101	1859		0	419	46737
	Someone yelled, no one came.
37	It couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy.	0	39094	282	29620		0	739	13397
	He shouldn’t have gambled with a clever girl.
38	It’s like beating your head against a brick wall.	0	2480	19447	512	10783	0	1543	19721	2091	18458
	It’s like riding my car over a rough street
39	Put that in your pipe and smoke it.	4	65620	764	3635		0	4312	14130	37002
	Drop those on the ground and break them.
40	To whom it may concern	21	5036	8471			0	546531	4244
	With that I am convinced
41	You can dish it out but you can’t take it	9	832	100571			0	100571	35560
	He may take her in but he won’t keep her

Note: The first sentence of each pair is a formulaic expression, the second a novel expression. Content words are boldfaced in the sentence. Content word frequencies are displayed in the same order that they appear in the sentence. CW = Content Word.