Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tS8oLlPOhPY&t=5m49s
In an episode of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2003), Michelangelo is attacked by a crocodile. After managing to escape it, he tells his brothers about it. Raphael then responds: "We should have seen it coming, bro. You’re one rib short of a barbecue."
What should they have seen coming? What does "You're on rib short of a barbecue" mean?
I tried Googling the idiom, but all I could find is a similar one: one rib short of a slab.
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0235553/characters/nm0188025
Malik Bishop : [narrating after O.G. Buddy cusses out their boss
Damien] Damien was definitely one rib short of a slab. Change was
definitely in the air: change for Buddy, change for Damien and change
for me. That afternoon I watched Buddy self-destruct just like I
watched my father self-destruct. Buddy knew that going up against
Damien was like blowing your own brains out. Damien was a crazy
motherfucker, that's for sure. Suddenly, the things that Buddy talked
about before, made sense: this was a shitty job.
Best Answer
To be short of an amount of something is to have less than that amount. E.g. if I am ten cents short of the dollar I need for something, I have 90 cents.
To say that someone is [one thing] or [a few things] short of [a complete set or collection of things] is to say that that person is mad or stupid - lacking a complete set of mental faculties. A slab is a butcher's term for all of the ribs on one side of a carcass, joined together.
One knife short of a cutlery drawer
One spanner (or wrench) short of a toolkit
A few slices short of a loaf
(etc)
Native speakers can invent such expressions and be understood.
be one ... short of a ... (Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English)
Australians say that a stupid person is 'not the full quid' (some pennies short of a pound [pre-decimal currency, succeeded in 1966 by Australian dollars, made up of 100 cents])