Busy as a beaver?

Posted by Kathy on July 30, 2007

"busy as a beaver" or "AS busy as a beaver" or both?

I want to know if these two sentences are acceptable:

a) She is busy as a beaver.
b) She is AS busy as a beaver.

What is the difference between them?

Well, actually, I'm thinking about the rule of simile. if we are to use "as", as I know, we always have to use two of them, to make a comparison.

in consideration of this rule, I think the sentence "_______ is busy as a beaver" is incorrect. I think we need to say "__________ is AS busy as a beaver"

or is the "as ______ as" rule not applicable to idioms?

Is the "busy as a beaver" idiom taken as an adjective as a whole?

I researched on the web and I found most of the examples say "___ is AS busy as a beaver" but others say simply " ____ is busy as a beaver".