lallygag

English

Alternative forms

• lollygag

Noun

lallygag (countable and uncountable, plural lallygags)

1. Horseplay, fooling around.
   • 1862 August, Harper's Magazine:

     Mr. Biggs paused and turned the flesh of the succulent lobster over with his finger. The gentleman inside addressed him: ‘Try er lobstaw, bossy?’ ‘Ain't got no money,’ said Mr. Biggs, still fingering the morsels. ‘Oh, come now, none o' that ere lallygag,’ responded the gentleman.

2. A layabout, one who lallygags.

   Synonyms: lollygagger; see also Thesaurus:idler

   • 1913, Gelett Burgess, Love in a Hurry, Bobbs-Merrill Company, page 8:

     ["]Why, you ought to have been ready half an hour ago!" she said, pushing him into his room fondly. "You're a lackadaisical lallygag, that's what you are! Do you realize how much you've got to do to-day, Mr. Bonistelle?"

Verb

lallygag (third-person singular simple present lallygags, present participle lallygagging, simple past and past participle lallygagged)

1. (See lollygag.) To dawdle; to be lazy or idle; to avoid necessary work or effort.
   • 1955, Agnes Newton Keith, Bare Feet in the Palace, Boston, Mass.: Little, Brown and Company, page 125:

     And don't you dare to lallygag about so that you don't get home till after dark, or I'll have every policeman in Parañaque out after you! Now, take care of yourselves, all of you.

2. (archaic, US) To pet, kiss, or otherwise demonstrate overt affection, generally in public.
   • 1894, Frederick Thickstun Clark, On Cloud Mountain: A Novel, New York, N.Y.: Harper and Brothers, page 115:

     "She's goin' to wait fer us down to Rothschild's bridge. 'N' her 'n' me 's goin' to set on the back seat together—" / "'N' lallygag," interrupted his mother. […] / "Oh, we allus lallygag when we git together, me 'n' Cynthy does." […]

   • 1898, William Cowper Brann, The Complete Works of Brann, the Iconoclast, page 257:

     Kissing is a game that should always be played in private. Those who must lallygag or perish should pull down the blinds.

Quotations

• For more quotations using this term, see Citations:lallygag.