finger to the wind
Word Rarity
Uncommon
Frequency: Zipf frequency 4.32 in modern English
26
Scrabble Score
15
Letters
3
Syllables
11
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
An attention to or focus on or awareness of current or prevailing trends, public opinion, or shifting circumstances.
Countable; Uncountable
Example Sentences
- "A crafty man-of-the-world keeps his finger to the wind."
- "I do not want to hold our fingers to the wind. I want to see us make solid, substantial decisions based on facts, not based on anecdote, if you will."
- "At the height of the great oil boom, in the frenzied summer of 1981 when everybody said oil prices could go nowhere but up, the crafty old Texas wildcatter put his finger to the wind and decided it was not going to last much longer."
- "The DPJ, in this view, had pursued a similar path: riding to power on the back of telegenic politicians and with a finger-to-the-wind fidelity to public opinion polls, the party had allowed, in effect, the mass media to dictate outcomes"
- "How they choose: They hold up a finger to the winds of recent awards results"
- "This is a reform that the ancien regime, always with a finger to the wind of public opinion, spotted as an electoral nightmare and ducked."