Swing the lead

(idm.)

(old-fashioned, BrE, informal) (usually used in the progressive tenses) to pretend to be ill/sick when in fact you are not, especially to avoid work

e.g. I don't think there's anything wrong with her — she's just swinging the lead.

我认为她没有什么病，只不过是在装病偷懒而已。

(origin) The lead was a weight at the bottom of a line that sailors used to measure how deep water was when the ship was near land. 'Swing the lead' was thought to be an easy task, and came to mean avoiding hard work.

lead是船靠近陆地时水手测量水深用的水鉈。swing the lead被认为是件轻松的工作，逐渐变成“逃避干重活”的意思。

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