Le mot du jour : “panier percé”
If you are a “panier percé” (i.e a basket full of holes), it means that you spend your money irresponsibly, like someone who doesn’t check the state of their basket before carrying food in it. 🙂
You can also find this idea in the expression “faire valser l’anse du panier” (to make the basket’s handle waltz = shake your basket so badly that everything falls out). You can picture the person happily skipping with their basket in hand, and all the precious things in it falling out!
It is usually used to talk about a person who is not very sensible with money.
These expressions bring up ancient times, but I guess people today would also say “faire chauffer la carte bleue” (to heat the credit card – which used to be blue in France)
