tea and toaster

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English

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Alternative forms

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Etymology

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From tea and toast +‎ -er.

Noun

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tea and toaster (plural tea and toasters)

  1. (informal, chiefly medicine) A person, usually elderly and frail, with a diet lacking in nutrition.
    • 1922, James Joyce, Finnegan's Wake:
      Again, if Father San Browne, tea and toaster to that quaintest of yarnspinners is Padre Don Bruno . . . .
    • 1964, B. A. Cooper, L. Lowenstein, “Relative Folate Deficiency of Erythrocytes in Pernicious Anemia and its Correction with Cyanocobalamin,”, in Blood, volume 24, page 505:
      The patients with inadequate diet admitted to ingesting a diet usually devoid of folate-rich food such as liver, kidney, and vegetables other than potatoes. Several probably were "tea and toasters."
    • 2003, Robert K. Murray et al., Harper's Illustrated Biochemistry, McGraw-Hill, →ISBN, page 586:
      Older people with poor dietary habits ("tea and toasters") may develop iron deficiency.
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See also

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