Run hot and cold

A kitchen faucet with the water running.
Running water is not the only thing that runs hot and cold.
(Photo: nomao saeki/Unsplash | Text: David/ArtisanEnglish.jp)

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Phrase: Run hot and cold

Have you ever thought about how the economy and emotions are similar?

Give me a second, and hear me out.

Just like the emotions of some people, the economy tends to run hot and cold.

When times are good, they are good, and when times are bad, boy, are they bad.

It’s the same thing for some people’s emotions.

A man or woman may feel hopelessly in love with their partner one moment and not be able to stand being in the same room with them the next.


When things run hot and cold, they alternate between two opposites, and those opposites are usually at the extreme ends of the scale.


Quite often, too, no one understands or can predict when things will change.

One year the economy is clipping along at a fantastic rate – employment, consumer confidence, and incomes skyrocket.

Then, seemingly without any warning, things switch from running hot to running cold – unemployment is rising, consumers stop spending, and incomes plummet.

I suppose John Maynard Keynes’ animal spirits may play a role, but just as in human relationships, it’s mostly emotions.

Then there are people who run hot and cold.

People like this are tough to read or understand because their emotions can turn on a dime.

It could be your boss who is very enthusiastic about the company finally embracing digitization on a Friday afternoon.

When everyone goes back to the office on the following Monday, she is suddenly not keen on the idea.

Things run hot and cold all the time.


Flesch-Kincaid Readability Test

This post is understandable by someone with at least an 8th-grade education (age 13 – 14).

On the Flesch-Kincaid reading-ease test, this post scores 67.

The easier a passage is to read, the higher the score on a scale of 0 – 100.



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