Examples
“Thus encouraged, Mr. Appel declared that he wished he would not fry the ham to chips and boil the "daylights" out of the coffee.”
“Not dreaming of any danger in that direction, the robber only thought of guarding his "daylights" against the hornbill upon the wing.”
“I have also used the daylights out of 3-9x scopes for general deer, antelope and coyote hunting.”
I am interested in buying a Leupold scope for my Remington 700 in 30-06.
“Nobody would take seriously a big brute of a bully who beat the daylights out of an innocent bystander, and then claimed he was victimized because he scraped his knuckles.”
The Huffington Post: Jeff Schweitzer: The Faux Rage About a False War on Christmas
“It's that time of year when little kids pull on masks and troll the neighborhood for candy, while adults overspend on costumes and thousands from all over Southern California flock to theme parks to have the daylights scared out of them.”
The Huffington Post: Glenn D. Braunstein, M.D.: Boooooooo! What Tricks, Treats Terrify You?
“If that were not ostracism enough, the women -- depicted so often as shy and demure in gauzy works of fiction with titles like that of Lee's play -- begin taking turns beating the daylights out of her.”
The Washington Post: Review: 'Songs of the Dragons Flying to Heaven' at Studio Theatre
“You guys beat the [daylights] out of me, and it kept me humble.”
The Washington Post: A mayor from the past ponders Gray's future
“It was not, however, a club where grown men beat the living daylights out of each other, as in the book and movie of the same title.”
“While I understand the dislike of this glorification, the source material certainly illustrates ruthless violence that also plays a major role in the life of someone who beats the daylights out of people with righteous justification.”
“Jordan "threw the daylights out of it" in Florida, Harris said, hitting 93 and 94 miles per hour on a fastball with some wicked sinking action.”
The Washington Post: Bryce Harper heads home, for now, as Arizona Fall League begins
Lists
‘daylights’ hasn't been added to any lists yet.
knitandpurl As in "to scare the living daylights out of" someone. David Crystal writes about this in By Hook or By Crook as follows: "The plural of daylight is known from the eighteenth century. Henry Fielding is the first recorded user, in Chapter 10 of his novel Amelia. During a lively piece of prison table-talk we hear one woman say of another, who has called her a 'good woman': 'Good woman! I don't use to be so treated. If the lady says such another word to me, d—n me, I will darken her daylights.' 'Black her eyes,' we would say these days. Daylights was slang for 'eyes'." (p 71)
Crystal goes on to talk about how "daylights" then came to mean other vital organs, not just they eyes, and says that "the living daylights" "seems to have arisen in the late nineteenth century. It became popular about fifty years later" (ibid.). Dec 15, 2008