a swing and a miss - sincere but unsuccessful attempt - холостой замах битой:

Boy, that joke was a swing and a miss—not one person in the room laughed.

Ooh, a swing and a miss, huh, buddy? Well, there's plenty of other girls to hit on here—maybe one of them will give you their number.

Good luck to you—my last attempt to get a raise out of the boss was a swing and miss.

Petty cash - an accessible store of money kept by an organization for expenditure on small items.

Take the money for stamps out of petty cash.

#vocab