sorry

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a sorry sight

Someone or something that has a piteous, woeful, or wretched appearance. Our son was a sorry sight after his six-month-long trip around Southeast Asia on his own. He said he had the time of his life, but to us he just looked skinny, dirty, and threadbare. The house was quite a sorry sight when we returned home. Trash and random junk were piled all over every room while scrawny, dirty cats prowled around, picking at various scraps of food. A: "Well, you're a sorry sight. What's wrong?" B: "Um, Shelly just broke up with me."
See also: sight, sorry

sorry about that

Glib or lighthearted recognition of some mistake one has made, regardless of how serious (or not) the mistake may be. Sometimes expressed more colloquially as "sorry 'bout that." A: "Oops, sorry about that. I didn't realize you were still using this computer." B: "Oh, don't worry about it. I'll just log in on a different one." A: "You ruined my entire batch of brownies!" B: "Oh yeah, sorry 'bout that. I needed the oven, though, so I just took them out."
See also: sorry, that
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms. © 2024 Farlex, Inc, all rights reserved.

(I'm) sorry.

an expression used to excuse oneself politely or apologize, especially when one has collided with someone, when one has offended someone, or to ask someone to repeat what has been said. "I'm sorry," I said to the woman I bumped into. I'm sorry, what did you say? I couldn't hear you.
McGraw-Hill Dictionary of American Idioms and Phrasal Verbs. © 2002 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.

sorry

and pathetic
mod. pitiful; drawing ridicule or scorn; worthy more of condemnation than pity. (In colloquial use these words are usually used in sarcasm and disgust.) You are one sorry bastard! You are a pathetic person and a pathetic example of a quarterback!
McGraw-Hill's Dictionary of American Slang and Colloquial Expressions Copyright © 2006 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
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References in periodicals archive ?
In asserting that "It is thus that ideals die; not in the conventional pageantry of honoured death, but sorrily, ignobly, while one's head is turned," the narrator suggests the extent to which the elephant is an important diversion in the narrative, a diversion both in the sense of a spectacular entertainment and in the sense of a deadly distraction.
Elephants in the Labyrinth of Empire: Modernism and the Menagerie in The Old Wives' Tale
Stacked up against a Boeing 747 or theConcorde, the average seaplane may seem sorrily passe.
Northwest exploring by seaplane ... cities, waterways, wild high country
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