on the tack

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English

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Adjective

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on the tack (not comparable)

  1. (nautical) Tacking.
  2. (slang) Without alcohol; teetotal.
    • 1952, Doris Lessing, Martha Quest, Panther, published 1974, page 152:
      For they were always going on the tack; a dozen pairs of sympathetic eyes would follow the consciously heroic youth as he wandered down the veranda with a glass of orange juice in his hand; and they asked anxiously, ‘How goes it, Frankie?’