A: Did you watch the video Peter posted?

    B: Yeah, so close! The car stopped on a dime to avoid slamming into a truck.

    Note: This idiom means to “come to a stop in a very short distance, end movement very quickly.” A dime, from the Latin decem, “ten,” is the smallest and thinnest U.S. coin. In metaphor, it signifies anything especially tiny. When you are driving, and mean to stop at a precise point, not in a general area — you stop on a dime. Anything that stopped well, usually a car with great brakes, is said to stop on a dime. Another example you may hear often is that someone like Stephen Curry “can stop on a dime and shoot from anywhere.”