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As different as chalk and cheese

Meaning

Two things that are very different from each other.

Origin

We have hundreds of phrases to indicate the similarity of one thing with another and similes like 'as alike as two peas in a pod' are commonplace in everyday speech. There are far fewer expressions that explicitly refer to the difference between things; 'as different as chalk and cheese' is the most commonly used. This is an old expression and the earliest citation is in John Gower's Middle English text Confessio Amantis, 1390: