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run of the mill

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run-of-the-mill

[ruhn-uhv-thuh-mil]
–adjective
merely average; commonplace; mediocre: just a plain, run-of-the-mill house; a run-of-the-mill performance.

Origin:
1925–30


ordinary, routine, everyday.
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2009.
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Cultural Dictionary

run of the mill

Common, ordinary, average: “His performance in the game was neither exemplary nor disastrous; it was simply run of the mill.”

The American Heritage® New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition
Copyright © 2005 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
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Slang Dictionary
run-of-the-mill

  1. mod.
    average; typical. (Referring to the typical quality of a product that comes out of a mill.) : This stuff is just run-of-the-mill.
Dictionary of American Slang and Colloquial Expressions by Richard A. Spears.Fourth Edition.
Copyright 2007. Published by McGraw Hill.
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Word Origin & History

run-of-the-mill 
"unspectacular," 1909, lit. in ref. to material yielded by a mill, etc., before sorting for quality. Fig use is from 1930.
Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2001 Douglas Harper
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Idioms & Phrases

run of the mill

Ordinary, average, as in There's nothing special about these singersthey're just run of the mill. This expression alludes to fabrics coming directly from a mill without having been sorted or inspected for quality. It has survived such similar phrases as run of the mine and run of the kiln, for the products of mines and kilns. [Late 1800s]

The American Heritage® Dictionary of Idioms by Christine Ammer.
Copyright © 1997. Published by Houghton Mifflin.
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