What does the phrase
I'm nowhere near ready
mean?
For example:
A:So, are you all packed for your trip?
B:No, I'm nowhere near ready.
I know the meaning of nowhere near is far from; not nearly but I don't know what I'm nowhere near ready means.
Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.
If "ready" was a place... they're nowhere near it. So, "far from ready" is another idiom that means the same thing - that is, not ready at all.
The word near, as you know, is a locative term. When we say I am nearly "ready", there is only the faintest whiff of the locative in the adverb nearly. We understand the word abstractly, not in spatial terms, to mean "almost".
However, when we say I'm nowhere near ready, there is more than a faint whiff of the locative. "Ready", which is a state, is being cast figuratively as being in a place. Literally, the place where I am is not a location anywhere in the vicinity of readiness.
This is an informal way of saying quite emphatically "I am far from ready".
I means your not ready at all. Your far from being ready or done from whatever you are doing, therefore you are "No where" near being ready. Not even close to finishing.
