огород городить

Literally, “to fence the vegetable garden”. However, огород has also a dated meaning of “fence, hedge”, hence also “to fence in”. It's uncertain which meaning assumed initially.^[1]

The idiom is known at least since the end of the 19th century. Usually, Russians didn't allocate a significant area to grow vegetables; it's assumed that there's no real sense to fence this part of garden plot, because a potential damage to vegetable garden seems a lesser problem than wasting resources to protect the place with a fence, hence the meaning of doing something intensively with a useless result.^[1]

• IPA^(key): [ɐɡɐˈrod ɡərɐˈdʲitʲ]

огоро́д городи́ть • (ogoród gorodítʹ) impf

1. (colloquial) to make a fuss; to initiate a troublesome but low-productive business
2. (colloquial, derogatory) to tell nonsense