Puzzle #337 · May 4, 2026
girl trouble
Featured
Every day one two-word expression or compound word used in American English.
Girl trouble refers to romantic difficulties a man is having with a woman or women — a jealous girlfriend, an angry ex, heartbreak, complications. It's a distinctly American, mid-twentieth-century phrase, the kind a teenager in a 1950s movie mumbles to his buddy at the malt shop when he's slumped over a milkshake.
The mirror phrase is “boy trouble,” used the same way for a woman dealing with romantic men problems. Both expressions frame the other person as the source of difficulty — a slightly dated framing, but the phrases live on in casual speech, country and blues lyrics, and old movie dialogue.
The title has been borrowed by a 1942 Don Ameche romantic comedy and by a long-running Tacoma garage rock band Girl Trouble is also the title of a documentary of three teenage girls in the San Francisco juvenile justice system.
The mirror phrase is “boy trouble,” used the same way for a woman dealing with romantic men problems. Both expressions frame the other person as the source of difficulty — a slightly dated framing, but the phrases live on in casual speech, country and blues lyrics, and old movie dialogue.
The title has been borrowed by a 1942 Don Ameche romantic comedy and by a long-running Tacoma garage rock band Girl Trouble is also the title of a documentary of three teenage girls in the San Francisco juvenile justice system.
Puzzle Appearances
The expression girl trouble has appeared in 1 puzzle:
- Puzzle #337 on May 4, 2026
Rate of Appearance in English Language Print
Google's Ngram project shows how often a pair of words has appeared in print every year since the 1800's.
Data from Google Books Ngram Viewer. Licensed under CC BY 3.0.
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