slipslop

English

Etymology

slip +‎ slop

Noun

slipslop (countable and uncountable, plural slipslops)

1. Nonsense; gibberish; twaddle.
   • 1810, The European Magazine and London Review containing portraits, views, biography, anecdotes, literature, history, politics, arts, manners, and amusements of the age. volume 58:

     ... they, consequently, both misconceive and misuse words ; and we are sorry to add, that this childish slipslop, those infantile blunders, is, and are, much more frequently a source of parental mirth, than of parental reprehension : yet it is certain, that such oral deviations, if suffered to continue unremakred, harden into habits, and fix, indelibly fix, the vernacular errors of infancy upon the minds of maturity.

   • 1843, P. Polypipe, “Music for the Billion!”, in The New monthly magazine:

     It is an average specimen of the slipslop and real ignorance generally existing upon the subject.

   • 1854, George Jacob Holyoake, The Reasoner - Volume 16, page 56:

     The slipslop which Roman priests, and even the most dignified among the number, are not ashamed to send forth to the world, is something quite inconceivable to those, at least, who have not been nurtured on diet of this kind.

   • 1855, The North British Review - Volumes 23-24, page 201:

     The slipslop which Sir Edward put into the mouth of Mrs. Mivers, the gibberish in which Beck gabbles, may, for all that we know, be totally unlike the language of the back-parlour and of the crossing; and while that doubt continues, the imitation gives us no pleasure.

   • 1911, The Century Illustrated Monthly Magazine, page 686:

     "So, the modern clergyman still believes in slipslop, does he?" he exclaimed in his most aggressive manner.

2. Poor writing; text that is imprecise, weak, or overly informal.
   • 1849, C Pridham, An Historical, Political and Statistical Account of Mauritius and its Dependencies:

     Imaginary woes, and sentimental slipslop find no responsive chord; but to the historian, the statist, and the geographer, and those who unveil the mysteries of the physical sciences, the field is ever open.

   • 1863, The Living Age - Volume 77, page 101:

     No detatched evidence of the slipslop of Mrs. Wood's style (and " East Lynne " was in this respect worse, not better, than " Verner's Pride ") will convey to one who has not read the book itself the impression of ill-written English that every page of her writing gives, even when it contains no technical faults.

   • 1895, Oliver Wendell Holmes, The Complete Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, page 336:

     Plant him in Boston, and his sheet he fills With all the slipslop of his threefold hills, Talks as if Nature kept her choicest smiles Within his radius of a dozen miles, And nations waited till his next Review Had made it plain what Providence must do.

   • 1978, V Haviland, Books for America's children: 1776–1976:

     Nathaniel Hawthorne is, for one, reported to have called him "a dealer in slipslop on many subjects."

3. A quantity of worthless things; mess.
   • 1831, WJ Neale, Cavendish, Or, The Patrician at Sea:

     This story slips for ever through my fingers. I'm very sorry, but I cannot help it; going to sea has given me such a turn for rambling ; besides, I cannot spare the room for all my slipslop.

   • 1994, T Merton, R Lax, A Catch of Anti-letters:

     Here in our smashing madcap twenty century country all is slipslop and upshot, coming out with moons and planets, down with awful swats at the poors and the darkened. Truly a madcap slipslop, you do well to avoid and to desist from thought of return.

   • 2011, I.B. Wingfield, Sunday in the Body of the Garden of Tyme, →ISBN:

     You wanted no one. I am the slipslop you called for.

4. Watery food or drink that is of inferior quality.
   • 2003, Rima Dulkinienė, Kerry Shawn Keys, With a needle in the heart:

     They vvere fed very poorly. Once a day they vvould get some slipslop.

   • 2005, Charles Harrington Elster, There's a Word for It (Revised Edition): A Grandiloquent Guide to Life, →ISBN:

     'Twas tea time by then, and I fancied a drop Of champagne or cognac—or any slipslop.

   • 2007, Jin Jia, A Brief Review on How Chinese and Western Catering Cultural Differences Influence the Translation of Chinese Cuisine (B.A. Thesis, Jiaxing University, Zhejiang Province, P.R.C.):

     In your days of leisure, swallow cakes made of broken rice, or cook “slipslop congee”, and hold the bowl between your two hands and eat it with shrugged shoulders.

5. A splashing, sloshing, or slapping sound.
   • 1949, William Kenneth Richmond, Saga of Swans: And, Harrier Over the Fen, page 7:

     The thought drove him forward the more quickly : he paddled strongly with alternate feet and was soon billowing through a regular slipslop of wavelets.

   • 1958, Chinese Literature, page 86:

     Only then did she hear the slipslop of a familiar footstep coming in through the gate.

   • 2005, Bella Bathurst, The Wreckers: A Story of Killing Seas, False Lights and Plundered Ships:

     The rumble of machinery is replaced by the slipslop of the sea against the hull and the splutterings of the VHF.

   • 2006, John Updike, Rabbit is Rich, →ISBN:

     Cindy is beside him suddenly, breathing in rhythm with the slipslop of the sea.

Adjective

slipslop (comparative more slipslop, superlative most slipslop)

1. Slipshod; loose and imprecise.
   • 1859, Report of the Sub-committee of the Madras Literary Society and Auxiliary of the Royal Asiatic Society on Writing Indian Words in Roman Characters:

     But with how little benefit, the slipslop spelling of proper names and technical terms in official correspondence, and the barbarous names which crowd the face of the best Indian maps, bear witness?

   • 1871, The Saturday Review of Politics, Literature, Science and Art:

     It is difficult to ascertain the course of the transaction from the slipslop phrases in which Mr. Gladstone as usual makes the Queen adopt the style of a. literary housemaid; but 'it may be collected that the audacious encroachments of General Butler's contituents and other American fishermen in Canadian waters had exposed their vessels to the risk of legal capture.

   • 1886, The Pall Mall Budget:

     Anything more slipslop than the way in which the inoculations are performed at the Rue d'Ulm it is impossible to imagine.

   • 1895, New Zealand. Parliament, Parliamentary Debates - Volume 87, page 412:

     The fact of the matter is that our legislation is constructed in a very slipslop and careless manner.

2. Tending to flop or slide about.
   • 1866, James Greenwood, The True History of a Little Ragamuffin, →ISBN, page 44:

     All the time this conversation had been going on, we had been scudding along at as brisk a pace as Mouldy's slipslop boots would permit, up the Old Bailey and by Newgate, (where my companions having inquired whether I knew at which door they brought people out to hang 'em, and received from me an intimation that I did not, kindly paused for a moment to enlighten me,) out into Ludgate Street, and across the road into turnings and twistings dingier than any I had yet met with.

   • 1991 -, Doris Read, The Lydia chronicles, →ISBN, page 109:

     It dawned on me, in a flash of insight, that slipslop dresses were just a temporary fad and that state of mind was more important than costume ...

   • 2014, Peter Nell, Immoral Times, →ISBN:

     An about late forties female in a red G-string swimming bottom with a see-through light yellow beach wrap, stooped to pick a small stone from her slipslop sandals.

Verb

slipslop (third-person singular simple present slipslops, present participle slipslopping, simple past and past participle slipslopped)

1. To move with a slapping or flopping action.
   • 1950, Percy Howard Newby, The young May moon, page 128:

     Both Ivor and Philip were cowed by this royal anger and they were silent for some time after she had slipslopped in her carpet slippers down the passage, muttering fiercely as she went.

   • 2000, Edward Stourton, Absolute Truth: The Struggle for Meaning in Today's Catholic Church, →ISBN:

     One man punts ferociously at the front, his companion steers languidly from the back, and together they maneuver their craft, its load barely clear of the water, to catch the breeze in a tattered sail as they slipslop their way across.

   • 2011, Lynda Page, A Bitter Legacy, →ISBN:

     She had a pair of old, oversized slippers on her feet that slipslopped as she walked.

2. To slide about like waves.
   • 1920, Century Illustrated Monthly Magazine - Volume 99, page 213:

     Below, among dark mysteries of the under-wharf, the water placidly slipslopped; the sea-wind blew gently in, fluffing a lock of hair across my face.

   • 1938, Emerson Waldman -, The Land is Large, page 109:

     They slipslopped and spilled over, some of their contents trickling back into the room, under the warped edge of the door.

   • 2007, Layne Maheu, Song of the Crow, →ISBN:

     The ample yellow yolk of it slipslopped back and forth in the pan, following the rocking of the ark.

References

• “slipslop”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.